Strained premixed flames: Effect of heat-loss, preferential diffusion and reversibility of the reaction

We provide an analytical description of the effect of preferential diffusion and volumetric heat-loss on strained premixed flames within a reversible chemistry model. The model comprises a single reversible reaction of the form F ⇌ P whose forward and backward rates follow an Arrhenius law. An asymptotic analysis of the problem is carried out in the limit of infinitely large activation energy of the forward reaction. The study allows for non-unit Lewis numbers for the fuel F and the product P. Two main contributions are made. The first contribution consists in identifying the fundamental differences in the asymptotic description of the non-adiabatic flame between the reversible and irreversible cases, and resolving the difficulties by a suitable generalization of the so-called nearequidiffusion flame approximation to the reversible case, including the derivation of appropriate jump conditions at the reaction sheet. This is used to demonstrate that the one-step reversible chemistry model is reducible to the classical irreversible chemistry model, provided that an effective reduced Lewis number l̄ and an effective heat-loss parameter κ̄ are used. The second contribution is the determination of the domain of the solutions and their multiplicity, for selected values of l̄, in the κ̄-ε plane, where ε is a non-dimensional measure of the strain rate. For l̄ <4.03, the diagrams are found to consist of four regions with one, two, three, and four solutions respectively, including the frozen solution. For 4.03 <l̄ <5.15, an additional region with three solutions is identified. For larger values of l̄, the two regions with three solutions merge, and the region with four solutions is of insignificant size. Our diagrams are found to be in good agreement with, and complementary to, numerically determined diagrams in flammability limit studies based on one-step and detailed chemistry models. They are also a valuable component in studying non-adiabatic premixed edge-flames. © 2011 Taylor & Francis.