ONSET OF BUOYANCY AND SURFACE-TENSION DRIVEN INSTABILITIES IN PRESENCE OF RANDOM VIBRATIONS

Onset of thermal convection in an incompressible fluid layer bounded between a perfectly heat conducting lower rigid plate and an upper free surface is analysed when the layer is subject to random vibrations. It is shown that when the vibrations are characterized by a white noise process, they hasten the onset of convection. Further it is shown that the stability zone is demarcated by an inverted parabola in the (R, M) plane.