Observations on the effect of time dependent gravitational fields on the thermal convective stability of a fluid layer heated from above Original Research Article

The effect of a time dependent gravity vector on the thermal stability of a fluid layer heated from above is explained physically and by way of a calculation. An analytical result for the stability is obtained and this is compared favorably with a full numerical calculation using Floquet coefficients. Two cases are studied. These are the single and double frequency cases. Contrary to our initial expectations the fluid layer can become more unstable as it is heated from above.