Behaviour of a sonic wave in dissociating gases
The present communication is devoted to the study of weak solutions of the system of hyperbolic partial differential equations in dissociating gas flows. As an application of the singular surface theory, the law of propagation and the growth equation of a sonic wave are obtained, and the breakdown of a sonic wave is also discussed. It is found that weak disturbances in dissociating gases propagate with the effective velocity of sound relative to the gas flow. The effects of dissociation and the wave geometry on the global behaviour of the wave amplitude are discussed. It is concluded that dissociation has a stabilizing effect on the sonic wave in the sense that either it disallows or delays shock formation. The two cases of diverging and converging waves are discussed separately.