Different convection dynamics in mixtures with the same separation ratio

Abstract
We report on convection near threshold in circular samples of radial aspect ratio Γ=11.5 using ethanol-water mixtures with two concentrations x, but with the same separation ratio Ψ0.08. For x=0.250, convection begins with transients that lead to a time-independent cell-filling state, typically in a day. For x=0.011, there is a range of temperature differences where repeated transients and aperiodically fluctuating localized regions of disordered convection persist for many days. In rare cases these lead to an apparently stable "wall" state of traveling waves surrounding pure conduction.