title: Front explosion in a periodically forced surface reaction.
abstract: Resonantly forced oscillatory reaction-diffusion systems can exhibit fronts with complicated interfacial structure separating phase-locked homogeneous states. For values of the forcing amplitude below a critical value the front "explodes" and the width of the interfacial zone grows without bound. Such front explosion phenomena are investigated for a realistic model of catalytic CO oxidation on a Pt(110) surface in the 2:1 and 3:1 resonantly forced regimes. In the 2:1 regime, the fronts are stationary and the front explosion leads to a defect-mediated turbulent state. In the 3:1 resonantly forced system, the fronts propagate. The front velocity tends to zero as the front explosion point is reached and the final asymptotic state is a 2:1 resonantly locked labyrinthine pattern. The front dynamics described here should be observable in experiment since the model has been shown to capture essential features of the CO oxidation reaction.
authors.affiliation: Max-Planck-Institut für Physik Komplexer Systeme, Nöthnitzer Strasse 38, 01187 Dresden, Germany. davidsen@pks.mpg.de
authors.forename: Jörn
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Davidsen
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mikhailov
authors.forename: Raymond
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Kapral