Horizontally propagating three-dimensional chemo-hydrodynamic patterns in the chlorite-tetrathionate reaction.

Planar reaction fronts resulting from the coupling of exothermic autocatalytic reactions and transport processes can be deformed by convection in the presence of gravity field. We have experimentally investigated how buoyancy affects the spatiotemporal pattern formation at various solution thicknesses in three-dimensional medium. In the chlorite-tetrathionate reaction, a stable structure propagating horizontally with constant velocity and geometry develops when appropriately thick solutions are studied. Both the horizontal and the vertical projections of the resulting three-dimensional structures are quantitatively characterized: the smooth leading edge of the front is independent of the solution thickness and the structured trailing edge ends in a center cusp with a constant angle.