The Critical Point of an Exothermic Reactor

摘要

Conditions for quenching and igniting an exothermic reactor differ from one another, since a hysteresis takes is represented as a peninsula terminating in a cups. At the cusp point, the difference between high-temperature and low-temperature regimes disappears. In this respect, the cusp is similar [1] to the critical point of a phase transition (e.g., the liquid-vapor transition) in which the distinction between phases disappears. As is well known, density fluctuations are strong at the critical point. Similarly, we can expect an increase in the chaotic pulsations of temperature and concentration in the neighborhood of the cusp. In contrast to equilibrium thermal fluctuations in the case of phase transitions, these pulsations are caused by small random variations in the composition and other parameters of the incoming mixture. Usually, such variations do not lead to marked changes in the reactor state. However, near the critical point in which the reactor susceptibility is especially high, the pulsation intensity increases infinitely when approaching this point. In this study, we investigated the chaotic behavior of the reactor in the critical region of parameters. The similarity with the critical point of phase transition relates to reactor steady-state regimes. Under certain conditions, the region of periodic regimes [2-4] can include a cusp. Below, we also consider the effect of this factor.