Stability of narrow-gap MHD Taylor-Couette flow with radial heating and constant heat flux at the outer cylinder

A linear stability analysis has been presented for hydromagnetic dissipative Couette flow, a viscous electrically conducting fluid between rotating concentric cylinders in the presence of a uniform axial magnetic field and constant heat flux at the outer cylinder. The narrow-gap equations with respect to axisymmetric disturbances are derived and solved by a direct numerical procedure. Both types of boundary conditions, conducting and non-conducting walls are considered. A parametric study covering on the basis of µ, the ratio of the angular velocity of the outer cylinder to that of inner cylinder, Q, the Hartmann number which represents the strength of the axial magnetic field, and N, the ratio of the Rayleigh number and Taylor number representing the supply of heat to the outer cylinder at constant rate is presented. The three cases of µ < 0 (counter rotating), µ > 0 (co-rotating) and µ = 0 (stationary outer cylinder) are considered wherein the magnetic Prandtl number is assumed to be small. Results show that the stability characteristics depend mainly on the conductivity on the cylinders and not on the heat supplied to the outer cylinder. As a departure from earlier results corresponding to isothermal as well as hydromagnetic flow, it is found that the critical wave number is strictly a monotonic decreasing function of Q for conducting walls. Also, the presence of constant heat flux leads to a fall in the critical wave number for counter rotating cylinders, which states that for large values of -µ, there occur transition from axisymmetric to non-axisymmetric disturbance whether the flow is hydrodynamic or hydromagnetic and this transition from axisymmetric to non-axisymmetric disturbance occur earlier as the strength of the magnetic field increases