Unveiling the bi-stable character of stealthy hydrogen-air flames

Ultra-lean hydrogen-air flames propagating in narrow gaps, under the influence of cold walls and high preferential diffusion, can form two distinct isolated structures. They exhibit either circular or double-cell shapes and propagate at different speeds, with the latter roughly doubling in size and traveling speed to the former. Hydrogen mass diffusivity, convective effects, and conductive heat losses are the physical mechanisms that explain the alterations in morphology and propagation speed. In previous experiments, Veiga-Lopez et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 124, 174501 (2020)] found these clearly distinguished flame structures for different combinations of equivalence ratio, channel gap, and the effect of gravity on the dynamics of upward and downward propagating flames in a vertical chamber. Present observations in horizontal channels show the simultaneous appearance of these two stable structures, which arise under identical experimental conditions and conform the first evidence that multiplicity of stable solutions coexists in real devices. To explain the observations, we performed numerical simulations using the simplified model, which shows that symmetry-breaking details during the ignition transient explain the concurrent emergence of the two stable configurations. This discovery urges the need to implement additional engineering tools to account for the possibility of the formation and propagation of isolated flame kernels at different speeds in hydrogen-fueled systems.