Perfect Wave-Number Selection and Drifting Patterns in Ramped Taylor Vortex Flow

Abstract
The wave-number band accessible to a homogeneous pattern-forming system collapses to a single wave number if the control parameters are ramped slowly in space from subcritical to supercritical. This selection mechanism is investigated for Taylor vortex flow. Quantitative agreement is found with recent experiments. By variation of both radii independently, any wave number within the stable band can be selected. In addition, there exist ramps which do not permit any static patterns but force them to drift. The drift velocity is calculated. Such a drift is not automatically induced by a large-scale flow.

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