Turbulent convection induced by weak unipolar injection in plane parallel electrode geometry

The turbulent electroconvective motion of an insulating liquid subjected to weak unipolar injection is examined in regimes of dominant viscous effects and dominant inertia effects. Order-of-magnitude analyses are developed which consider two boundary layers adjacent to the electrodes, a core and intermediate regions. The main features of the electroconvective regimes are derived and used to predict the heat transfer that can be achieved in conditions where buoyancy plays only a negligible role. Laws of variation of the typical turbulent velocity for weak injection electroconvection and of the Nusselt number with the electrical parameters for both viscous and inertially dominated regimes are derived. An experiment using oils of different viscosities was performed to test the obtained laws. For Reynolds number convection, the experimental results support the analysis.<>