Simple and accurate theory for strong shock waves in a dense hard-sphere fluid.
Following an earlier work by Holian et al. [Phys. Rev. E 47, R24 (1993)] for a dilute gas, we present a theory for strong shock waves in a hard-sphere fluid described by the Enskog equation. The idea is to use the Navier-Stokes hydrodynamic equations but taking the temperature in the direction of shock propagation rather than the actual temperature in the computation of the transport coefficients. In general, for finite densities, this theory agrees much better with Monte Carlo simulations than the Navier-Stokes and (linear) Burnett theories, in contrast to the well-known superiority of the Burnett theory for dilute gases.
Montanero
J M
JM
Departamento de Electrónica e Ingeniería Electromecánica, Universidad de Extremadura, E-06071 Badajoz, Spain. jmm@unex.es
López de Haro
M
M
Santos
A
A
Garzó
V
V