Exact solutions for a periodic assembly of bubbles in a Hele-Shaw channel

Abstract

Exact solutions are reported for a periodic assembly of bubbles steadily co-travelling in a Hele-Shaw channel. The solutions are obtained as conformal mappings from a multiply connected circular domain in an auxiliary complex plane to the flow region in a period cell. The conformal mappings are constructed using the generalized Schwarz-Christoffel formula for multiply connected polygonal domains in terms of products of Schottky-Klein prime functions. It is shown that previous solutions for multiple steady bubbles in a Hele-Shaw cell are all particular cases of the solutions described herein. Examples of specific bubble configurations are discussed.