Viscous fingering in magnetic fluids: numerical simulation of radial Hele-Shaw flow

In this paper, the viscous fingering phenomena of the magnetic liquids in the case when the magnetic field is applied normally to the Hele-Shaw cell. is investigated by the numerical simulation technique. It is shown that the magnetic field causes additional destabilization of the free interface arising at the air injection in the magnetic liquid. Here the peculiarities of the interface dynamics - inward motion of the tips of the fjords, the gyration radius dependence on the perimeter found by the numerical simulations are in good accordance with the experiments. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.