Stability of Self Similar Flows of Second Kind in the Neighbourhood of a Critical Point

Abstract

Following method developed by Bhatnagar & Prasad, based on the investigations of Kulikovskii & Slobodkina, we study the stability of self-similar flows generated by the propagation of shock-wave in an inhomogeneous medium with density varying either exponentially or as a power of distance. Also we consider the shocks produced by impulsive load. We find that all these flows are stable in the neighbourhood of critical point, which is a saddle point of the system of differential equations governing the flow in its neighbourhood.