Spherical shock waves in a dusty gas

The conservation equations for the flow field developed behind a spherical shock wave propagating into a dusty medium (gas seeded with small uniformly distributed solid particles) are solved numerically by using the random choice method. The solutions obtained were compared with a similar pure-gas case. It was found that the dust presence weakens the shock wave, i.e., the gas velocity, temperature, and pressure immediately behind the shock-wave front were lower than those obtained in a similar pure-gas case. The presence of dust changed the flow field behind the shock wave. The typical spherical-wave pressure signature (a monotonic reduction in the pressure after the jump across the shock-wave front) changed to a different shape. The pressure increased after the shock-wave front until it reached a maximum value followed by a monotonic pressure reduction. The maximum pressure was attained between the shock-wave front and the contact surface. Higher values of total pressure were obtained in the dusty-gas case. The initial uniform spatial distribution of the dust particles changed into a bell-shaped pattern with a pronounced peak.