Convex entropy, Hopf bifurcation, and viscous and inviscid shock stability

TL;DR

This paper investigates the relationship between inviscid and viscous shock stability in systems with convex entropy, revealing conditions under which various instabilities can occur and highlighting open questions in viscous shock theory.

Contribution

It provides analytical and numerical criteria for shock stability and demonstrates the occurrence of certain instabilities in systems with convex entropy, addressing key open problems.

Findings

Inviscid instability can occur in hyperbolic gas dynamics.

Viscous instability not detected by inviscid theory can occur.

Hopf bifurcation or 'galloping instability' can occur in viscous systems.

Abstract

We consider by a combination of analytical and numerical techniques some basic questions regarding the relations between inviscid and viscous stability and existence of a convex entropy. Specifically, for a system possessing a convex entropy, in particular for the equations of gas dynamics with a convex equation of state, we ask: (i) can inviscid instability occur? (ii) can there occur viscous instability not detected by inviscid theory? (iii) can there occur the ---necessarily viscous--- effect of Hopf bifurcation, or "galloping instability"? and, perhaps most important from a practical point of view, (iv) as shock amplitude is increased from the (stable) weak-amplitude limit, can there occur a first transition from viscous stability to instability that is not detected by inviscid theory? We show that (i) does occur for strictly hyperbolic, genuinely nonlinear gas dynamics with certain convex equations of state, while (ii) and (iii) do occur for an artifically constructed system with convex viscosity-compatible entropy. We do not know of an example for which (iv) occurs, leaving this as a key open question in viscous shock theory, related to the principal eigenvalue property of Sturm Liouville and related operators. In analogy with, and partly proceeding close to, the analysis of Smith on (non-)uniqueness of the Riemann problem, we obtain convenient criteria for shock (in)stability in the form of necessary and sufficient conditions on the equation of state.