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# 1. The Status of the Null Energy Condition

## 1. The Status of the Null Energy Condition

One of the major themes of recent theory has been the concept of holography, which originated from considerations of black hole entropy. This aspect of holography has been developed into the Covariant Entropy Bound, introduced by Bousso in . \[We shall mostly follow the recent review paper \]. The entropy bound is particularly important as a testing ground for holographic ideas because it has been articulated with great precision and clarity.

Previous discussions of the entropy bound have assumed the validity of the Null Energy Condition \[NEC\], which just requires that for any null vector $`k^a`$, the stress tensor should satisfy

$$T_{ab}k^ak^b0.$$
(1)
In general, this condition is not particularly well-motivated, unless one is also assuming the Weak Energy Condition \[which implies the NEC by continuity\]; the physical meaning of “observers” moving at the speed of light is dubious indeed. But it is rather reasonable here. For without it we must expect, in general, to find zero-vorticity null congruences with permanently negative expansion, and this would generically lead to “lightsheets”  with infinite entropy. Until very recently, in any case, few doubted the universal validity of the NEC \[except perhaps in very exotic circumstances, remote from observations \]. Furthermore, it was generally thought that there are strong theoretical reasons for doubting the existence of NEC-violating matter.

The sensational failure of the Strong Energy Condition revealed by the discovery of cosmic acceleration  has, however, changed many attitudes to energy conditions. Recently, old arguments for the NEC have been challenged  and the observational situation has been reviewed more critically . As the full extent of the challenge to the NEC does not appear to have been widely appreciated, let us very briefly survey the current position.

There is now convincing observational evidence that the density of the baryonic and dark matter in our universe is far smaller than the critical density. Yet the many successes of the CDM model provide, along with the cosmic microwave data obtained in recent years, an almost equally convincing argument that the universe is spatially flat. General Relativity then implies that our world must contain vast quantities of “dark energy” with a positive density which reconciles the two sets of observations. The celebrated supernova observations merely confirm this conclusion. \[See  for a cautious review of the observations.\]

None of this is very strange; the fact that we cannot “see” most of the contents of our universe is regrettable but not unexpected. What is strange is the time evolution of the density of the dark energy. At the time of the synthesis of the light elements, its density must have been negligible compared with the density of radiation. Yet today it dominates all other forms of matter and energy combined. The usual inference is that the dark energy has an extraordinary property: its density does not change as the universe expands. \[Alternatively, it is assumed that its density declines very slowly, as in quintessence models; see .\] This is the cosmological constant model. But if we are willing to entertain such a strange possibility, we should also be willing to consider the possibility that the dark energy density actually increases as the universe expands. This is, after all, the most obvious interpretation of the facts: the dark energy density was negligible in the past, is dominant now, and presumably — unless we are privileged to live at a very special point in time — will be still more dominant in the future.

In fact, Frampton  has recently argued that exotic dispersion relations \[motivated by “stringy dark energy” cosmologies , descendants of the well-known Brandenberger-Vafa cosmologies \], naturally lead to an increasing density for the dark energy. While the basis of the particular model discussed in  is somewhat controversial , the basic idea that non-standard dispersion relations can lead naturally to an increasing density is worth exploring, even if it is true that a realistic model requires fine-tuning. To see the consequences of this, consider the equation expressing the vanishing of the divergence of the dark energy stress tensor :

$$\frac{d\rho }{dt}+3(\rho +p)\frac{da}{dt}/a=0.$$
(2)
This may be written as

$$\frac{dln(\rho )}{dln(a)}=3(1+w),$$
(3)
where $`w`$ is the dark energy equation-of-state parameter, the ratio of its pressure to its density, and $`a`$ is the scale factor. Thus we see that the density is constant if $`w=1`$, the case of a cosmological constant, and that it increases as the universe expands only if $`w<1`$. Thus the idea that the dark energy density is increasing requires us to take such values seriously.

While Frampton’s theory appears to be the first string-based model actually to require $`w<1`$ as a matter of basic principle, violations of the NEC have in fact been proposed in quite a number of recent works. We shall now give a very compressed and incomplete survey of this literature. The intention here is not to persuade the reader that the NEC is violated either in cosmology or otherwise, but merely to demonstrate that such violations are not completely out of the question. The relevant works can be roughly categorised as follows.

First, one of the earliest instances of a challenge to the NEC arose in connection with inflation, where, in some versions, upward fluctuations of the Hubble parameter are required. The Einstein equations imply that such fluctuations must violate the NEC. See  for a discussion of this.

Second, scalar fields have of course long played an important role in cosmology, and non-minimally coupled scalars can easily lead to interesting violations of the NEC. See for example , and also  for a different approach.

Third, it is well known that quantum effects can lead to local violations of the NEC; see  for a sample of recent important work, and note that some of this work calls into question the widespread belief that quantum violations of the NEC are necessarily tightly constrained, particularly in higher dimensions. Violations of the NEC arising in quantum field theory have been directly applied to cosmology in several papers by Parker and collaborators ; this work is notable for its specific prediction that $`w`$ should indeed be less than $`1`$. See also . Quantum gravity theories can also lead to such phenomena: see for example , which requires strong violations of the NEC in the remote past \[though not at present\].

Fourth, \[at least temporary\] violations of the NEC are required in many models which attempt to replace the Big Bang with a \[smooth\] “bounce”. Much of this work has been stimulated by the “cyclic” and “ekpyrotic” theories . See  for a sample of this literature. It is particularly important to note that bounces can arise from effective violations of the NEC when a generalised action involving higher-derivative terms is used. This point is explored in a major work of Tsujikawa, Brandenberger, and Finelli .

Fifth, NEC violations appear quite naturally in braneworld cosmologies: see  and its references for examples. The $`w<1`$ aspect is discussed explicitly in . Recently Dabrowski and co-workers  have made the claim that realistic braneworld cosmologies actually demand $`w<1`$. A very important development in this line is the work of Kachru and McAllister , who discuss an NEC-violating braneworld model in the context of the Klebanov-Strassler solution of a Calabi-Yau compactification of II B string theory. Whether or not it is realistic, this example is important because it is often argued against NEC-violating theories that the underlying matter fields violate unitarity. That is indeed the case for very simple matter models, such as a single scalar field, but the Kachru-McAllister example shows that it may not be so in more complicated cases. The point is that apparent misbehaviour of an effective four-dimensional theory can be alleviated at a higher level. Notice too that this example indicates that string theory is not completely incompatible with violations of the NEC.

Finally, and of course most importantly, the observational evidence for the Cosmological NEC \[that is, the statement that $`w1`$\] is not entirely convincing, as Caldwell  noted in a seminal paper; see also  for observationally-oriented papers in which the possibility that $`w`$ could be less than $`1`$ is considered. One very recent analysis  of the data claims, very tentatively, that they support the NEC; another , almost simultaneous, claims that $`w<1`$ is still a very real possibility. In short, the NEC is not, as is widely believed, well supported by the observations: the data are, at present, inconclusive.

We can summarise all this very simply: there are good theoretical and observational reasons to question the universal validity of the NEC. This does not mean that the NEC, or its cosmological version, should be abandoned forthwith. What it does mean is that the truth of the NEC is not a trivial matter; it is no longer acceptable merely to assume it without further comment.

In this work, we shall be concerned exclusively with the Cosmological NEC. As is emphasised in , the distinction is important, because the existence of NEC-violating matter at the cosmological level does not imply that we can necessarily isolate or manipulate “chunks” of such matter so as to construct exotic objects such as wormholes. Conversely, it may be possible to give theoretical arguments which support the Cosmological NEC, without implying that the NEC is universally valid. If it is eventually confirmed that the data point to $`w1`$, this will mean that the Cosmological NEC is an observational fact requiring a theoretical explanation, just as the cosmic acceleration is a fact requiring explanation. We propose to seek this explanation in holography, in the particular guise discussed by Bousso in .

While the NEC is, as explained earlier, very useful in discussions of the entropy bound, it does not of course follow that the NEC is absolutely necessary here. In some cases, the NEC-violating matter could be such that the entropy on lightsheets is still always finite. If such examples can be found, then perhaps \[a suitably modified version of\] the entropy bound need no longer rely on the NEC. We shall present an extremely simple example of this kind. It is motivated by the “self-tuning” brane cosmologies. \[See  for a recent discussion and for references.\] In these models, the cosmological constant on the braneworld is automatically “tuned away” by the bulk, and the brane becomes flat. It has been shown by Cline and Firouzjahi  that the most promising versions of this idea actually require a violation of the NEC in the bulk \[granted that it is not violated on the brane\], so this is quite a natural context for considering NEC-violation. \[Another unusual, and possibly related, form of matter in the bulk is the Casimir energy. See  and its references.\] We stress, however, that we are not proposing this as even a quasi-realistic braneworld model. We shall not discuss the binding of the graviton to the brane, the effect of more complicated models of NEC-violating matter, whether there are interesting perturbations away from exact flatness of the brane, and so on. Our objectives are more basic: we simply wish to determine whether this form of holography can make sense in the presence of very simple NEC-violating matter.

The example is obtained, after a brief explanation of the usual motivation for using the NEC, by simply introducing NEC-violating matter into $`AdS_5`$ in such a manner that the negative cosmological constant on the well-known Karch-Randall brane  is relaxed to zero. A numerical investigation shows that the entropy on lightsheets emanating from the brane remains finite, confirming that the NEC is not necessary to ensure this. Nevertheless, in the following section we show that the holographic formulation of this situation is not just physically unrealistic — it is internally inconsistent, by the Bousso-Randall consistency condition . The meaning of this is discussed in the Conclusion.

## 2. The Raychaudhuri Equation and Lightsheets

Given a surface of $`n1`$ spatial dimensions and area $`A`$ in an $`n+1`$ dimensional spacetime, the n dimensional null hypersurfaces corresponding to null geodesics pointing directly towards directions in which the expansion, $`\theta `$, is non-positive, are called  lightsheets. The Covariant Entropy Bound states that the entropy on any lightsheet is bounded by $`A/4`$ in Planck units. Obviously it is desirable that lightsheets should terminate at a finite distance, since otherwise we are in danger of having infinite entropy on the lightsheet. \[Actually this does not necessarily follow, since the geometry may be such that infinite distance corresponds to finite volume, as in the case of the Poincaré patch of AdS. Even if the volume is infinite, the relevant energy density may decay towards infinity — in fact this must be the case if we are to obtain an asymptotically AdS spacetime — and so infinite volume might correspond to finite energy and perhaps finite entropy. Usually, however, the volume elements of asymptotically AdS spaces increase too rapidly for this to save the day.\]

By definition, the lightsheet terminates when the expansion is about to become positive. The null version of the Raychaudhuri equation \[, page 222\],

$$\frac{d\theta }{d\lambda }=\frac{1}{n1}\theta ^2\sigma _{ab}\sigma ^{ab}+\omega _{ab}\omega ^{ab}8\pi T_{ab}k^ak^b,$$
(4)
where $`\lambda `$ is an affine parameter for a null geodesic congruence, $`k^a`$ is the tangent vector, $`\sigma _{ab}`$ is the shear, and $`\omega _{ab}`$ is the vorticity, shows that lightsheets must terminate at a finite value of the affine parameter, provided that the vorticity is zero and the NEC is satisfied. \[The equation governing the evolution of the vorticity \[, page 223\] ensures that if the congruence is initially hypersurface-normal, then the vorticity is permanently zero, so we can ignore this term.\] For in that case, the right side is clearly negative if the initial value of $`\theta `$ is non-zero, and it is easy to show that $`\theta `$ tends to $`\mathrm{}`$ at a finite value of $`\lambda `$. Again, for a generic geometry, this means that all lightsheets end on a caustic at a finite distance from the initial area. If the NEC is not satisfied away from the initial surface, then there are various possibilities.

Firstly, of course, the first two terms on the right hand side may still dominate, and a caustic may still form. The entropy on the lightsheet will then still be finite. However, one could try to argue as follows. It is clear from the Raychaudhuri equation that the introduction of NEC-violating matter will cause the right-hand side of the equation, and therefore the slope of $`\theta `$ as a function of $`\lambda `$, to become less negative. This will mean that the caustic will form at a larger value of $`\lambda `$, so the lightsheet may extend farther. In a situation in which the entropy bound is saturated or nearly saturated, the result could be a violation of the entropy bound. The problem with this kind of argument is that $`\lambda `$ is not related in any simple, general way to the distance to the caustic. In fact, the relationship between $`\lambda `$ and distance is influenced by the kind of matter we introduce, and so is the initial value of $`\theta `$. Hence, a larger value of $`\lambda `$ does not necessarily mean that the caustic has moved farther away, and so one cannot conclude directly that NEC-violating matter endangers the usual entropy bound \[in terms of $`A/4`$\]. Perhaps the usual bound is always protected in this way, though it seems more likely that the $`A/4`$ bound does have to be replaced by an expression depending both on $`A`$ and on some parameter which measures the amount of NEC-violating matter. For the present, the point we wish to stress is that, if a caustic still forms, the entropy is at least still bounded, so some kind of simple entropy bound might still exist.

Alternatively, the last term in equation 4 may dominate and cause $`\theta `$ eventually to increase and become positive without first diverging to $`\mathrm{}`$. This would still be perfectly acceptable, since the lightsheet would terminate when $`\theta `$ vanishes; the entropy would still be bounded, again perhaps by some expression involving the area and a parameter measuring NEC-violation. \[Of course, if the density and pressure are not constant, we could have both kinds of behaviour, depending on the position of the starting point from which one uses the Raychaudhuri equation to evolve the expansion.\]

The problem lies in intermediate cases: for example, if the positive and negative terms in the right side of the Raychaudhuri equation both asymptotically approach constant values and cancel each other, then $`\theta `$ might asymptotically approach some fixed negative value or zero, without ever diverging or vanishing. That is, $`\theta `$ might remain permanently negative, and so the lightsheet might never terminate. \[This could of course also happen in other ways if the stress-energy tensor is more complex — for example, the final term in the Raychaudhuri equation might oscillate permanently, and so on.\] Generically \[that is, unless the geometry or the matter distribution is very special\] that would mean that the entropy on the light sheet would not be finite, and so no entropy bound could be true. Obviously it would be a grave blow to the holographic programme if one could construct a physically well-motivated example in which a finite area corresponds to a volume containing an infinite amount of entropy.

It is clear from this discussion that it is not possible to make a general statement about what happens to the entropy bound when the NEC is violated. Perhaps the NEC-violating matter is such that $`\theta `$ either always diverges or always vanishes after a finite affine parameter value, in which case some kind of entropy bound might continue to make sense \[if finite affine parameter corresponds to finite distance\]. One might think that it would be difficult to construct an example of this kind, however. Surprisingly, guided by physical considerations, one can in fact do this quite easily. This is the subject of the next section.

## 3. An Example of a NEC-Violating Spacetime With Finite Entropy on Lightsheets

In view of the above discussion, we propose that a good way to probe fundamental aspects of holography is to introduce NEC-violating matter into Anti-deSitter space, $`AdS_5`$. The hope is that whatever we learn in this way — perhaps from the AdS/CFT correspondence — will teach us something about the status of NEC-violating matter in cosmology.

Of course, there are many ways in which one might do this. As the only form of NEC-violating matter which is close to being observed is \[possibly\] the cosmological dark energy, it is natural to use a “cosmological” model of the matter. In cosmology it is customary to model the matter content of the universe with matter having a constant \[or piecewise constant\] equation-of-state parameter $`w`$, simply because the data are not yet capable of detecting variations of $`w`$ with time. The simplicity of the resulting equation of state allows one  to obtain an exact solution of the Einstein equation, and this again is a major advantage. Therefore, to the extent that the densities and pressures of the NEC-violating matter in our model can have a ratio differing from $`1`$, we shall take the ratio to be a constant.

In order to obtain a concrete model, we must now choose a particular representation of $`AdS_5`$. One of the most interesting representations of $`AdS_5`$ is obtained by foliating it by copies of $`AdS_4`$. If $`g(AdS_n)`$ is the metric on $`AdS_n`$, then this foliation is expressed by

$$g(AdS_5)=drdr+cosh^2(\frac{r}{L})g(AdS_4),$$
(5)
where $`r`$ is a coordinate which ranges from $`\mathrm{}`$ to $`+\mathrm{}`$, and $`L`$ is the “radius” of $`AdS_n`$. This representation of the metric was used by Karch and Randall  to investigate the “locality of localization”. By cutting off the $`AdS_5`$ bulk at some fixed value of $`r`$, one obtains a braneworld model with an $`AdS_4`$ brane. Of course, this is not even a quasi-realistic model \[but see \] since the cosmological constant on the brane is negative; in order to make it more realistic, one might try to modify the matter content of the bulk in such a way that the negative cosmological constant on the brane relaxes to zero. Although the models they consider are quite different, the results of Cline and Firouzjahi suggest that this can probably only be done by using NEC-violating matter. Thus we have a very natural setting for investigating the holography of such matter: introduce it into the Karch-Randall model in such a way that the brane cosmological constant is reduced to zero. Of course our interest is in the holography of this situation, not in trying to produce a truly realistic variant of the Karch-Randall model.

We therefore begin with the familiar ansatz

$$g(bulk)=drdr+e^{2A(r)}\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j,$$
(6)
where $`r`$ is as above, where $`A(r)`$ is a function to be determined and $`\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j`$ is the Minkowski metric. This is of course the standard metric ansatz for a bulk corresponding to a flat brane; see for example . Now if we consider forms of cosmological matter which are designed to have pressure $`p`$ and positive density $`\rho `$ such that $`p<\rho `$ when all fields depend only on time, then we shall find that they behave in a similar way if we introduce them into a geometry with a metric of the form given by equation 6. For example, Caldwell  considers a toy model of NEC-violating matter obtained simply by reversing the sign of the kinetic term in a standard scalar field Lagrangian with a positive potential. \[See  for an example of this kind of behaviour arising in string theory; see also  for other approaches.\] The \[five-dimensional\] stress tensor of such a field in the geometry given by equation 6 is

$$T_{\mu \nu }=_\mu \varphi _\nu \varphi +\frac{1}{2}g_{\mu \nu }_\alpha \varphi ^\alpha \varphi g_{\mu \nu }V(\varphi ),$$
(7)
and if we assume now that $`\varphi `$ depends only on $`r`$ we find that the density is

$$\rho =\frac{1}{2}(\varphi ^{})^2+V(\varphi ),$$
(8)
where $`\varphi ^{}`$ is the derivative of $`\varphi `$ with respect to $`r`$. The pressure transverse to the brane is

$$p_T=\frac{1}{2}(\varphi ^{})^2V(\varphi ),$$
(9)
while the pressures parallel to the brane are all given by

$$p_P=\frac{1}{2}(\varphi ^{})^2V(\varphi ),$$
(10)
which of course is just the negative of $`\rho `$, as required by Poincaré invariance in the direction parallel to the brane. We see at once that $`\rho `$ is always positive for sufficiently large potentials, but that $`p_T\rho `$. A similar result holds for the more complicated NEC-violating matter discussed by Melchiorri et al . Thus, introducing such matter into a geometry given by equation 6, we will obtain in general a matter distribution with anisotropic pressures; the pressure is equal to minus the density $`\rho `$ in the direction parallel to the brane, and the transverse pressure $`p_T`$ is less than $`\rho `$ .

As explained earlier, we shall follow cosmological practice and approximate the “transversal equation of state” of the NEC-violating matter, whatever it may be, by

$$p_T=w\rho ,$$
(11)
where $`w`$ is a constant satisfying $`w<1`$. This matter is to be superimposed on the $`AdS_5`$ background, with its density $`3/(4\pi L^2)`$ and its pressure $`+3/(4\pi L^2)`$. From  we have Einstein equations

$$3A^{\prime \prime }6(A^{})^2=8\pi (\frac{3}{4\pi L^2}+\rho ),$$
(12)
and

$$6(A^{})^2=8\pi (\frac{3}{4\pi L^2}+p_T),$$
(13)
where $`p_T`$ is related to $`\rho `$ by equation 11.

From equation 13 we have

$$8\pi \frac{dp_T}{dr}=12A^{}A^{\prime \prime },$$
(14)
and since 12 and 13 imply

$$3A^{\prime \prime }=8\pi (\rho +p_T),$$
(15)
we have

$$\frac{dp_T}{dr}=4A^{}(\rho +p_T).$$
(16)
Combining this with equation 11 we have

$$\frac{dp_T}{dA}=4(1+w^1)p_T.$$
(17)
It is convenient now to define a parameter $`\beta `$ by

$$\beta =4(1+w^1).$$
(18)
Clearly $`\beta `$ is a number satisfying $`0<\beta <4`$. Solving equation 17 we obtain

$$p_T=Pe^{\beta A},$$
(19)
where $`P`$ is a positive constant. Equation 13 now becomes

$$6(A^{})^2=8\pi (\frac{3}{4\pi L^2}Pe^{\beta A}),$$
(20)
and this is a differential equation to be solved for $`A`$.

This equation can be solved in terms of elementary functions: we have

$$e^A=(\frac{4\pi L^2P}{3})^{1/\beta }cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),$$
(21)
and so our NEC-violating metric is

$$g(NECV)=drdr+(\frac{4\pi L^2P}{3})^{2/\beta }cosh^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j.$$
(22)
By scaling the Minkowski coordinates on the brane, we can of course adjust the value of $`P`$ arbitrarily, to suit our convenience. One possible choice is $`P=3/4\pi L^2`$, which is useful for studying the limit when $`\beta `$ tends to zero: since the limit of $`cosh^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})`$ is unity, we see that the metric becomes flat. This is reasonable, since in that limit we are simply using a positive cosmological constant to cancel the background $`AdS_5`$ negative cosmological constant, and of course the metric should be flat in that case. Another useful choice of $`P`$, the one we shall adopt henceforth, is obtained by noticing that for values of $`r`$ tending to $`\mathrm{}`$, the metric is approximately

$$drdr+(\frac{\pi L^2P}{3})^{2/\beta }e^{(2r/L)}\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j.$$
(23)
Thus we regain precisely the standard $`AdS_5`$ metric near infinity if we choose $`P=3/\pi L^2`$. Our metric is then

$$g(NECV)=drdr+4^{(2/\beta )}cosh^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j,$$
(24)
and this discussion shows that our metric is asymptotic to the $`AdS_5`$ metric in a quite straightforward sense. Clearly the matter is concentrated near the “throat” at $`r=0`$; the density and pressure must approach the AdS values as we move towards the boundary. In fact we have

$$p_T+\rho =\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }\beta }{32\pi }sech^2(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),$$
(25)
where $`\mathrm{\Lambda }=6/L^2`$ is the cosmological constant of the background $`AdS_5`$. Thus indeed the NEC-violating combination $`p_T+\rho `$ attains its maximum magnitude $`|\frac{\mathrm{\Lambda }\beta }{32\pi }|`$ at $`r=0`$, and it increases towards zero as the boundary is neared.

Like the Karch-Randall metric, our metric is completely free of all singularities; and, as in that case, the form of the metric suggests that the boundary is disconnected; but this is not so. In both cases, the $`r=constant`$ slices are themselves infinitely large \[$`AdS_4`$ for Karch and Randall, Minkowski space here\] and they all intersect “at infinity” in such a way that the boundary is in fact connected. Notice that, again as in the Karch-Randall case, the function $`A`$ satisfies $`A^{\prime \prime }>0`$; this is clear from equation 15. However, in the Karch-Randall case this was due to the negative cosmological constant on the brane — that is, it was ultimately due to the fact that the Weak Energy Condition \[WEC\] is violated both on the brane and in the bulk. Here it is due simply to the fact that we are violating the NEC instead of the WEC. In fact, if the conjectural identification of the c-function given in  is correct, then the AdS/CFT interpretation of NEC-violating matter in the bulk is precisely that the c-function of the CFT on the boundary should evolve in just the opposite way to the usual. Naturally, as is pointed out in , exotic matter in the bulk should correspond to exotic behaviour of the CFT on the boundary.

Now, following Karch and Randall, we set up a braneworld at a specific negative value of $`r`$, namely $`r=c`$, where $`c`$ is positive. We cut away all smaller values of $`r`$ and reflect around the cut point. \[Henceforth, however, we shall ignore the other half of the bulk.\] Exactly as for Karch and Randall, we have a warp factor which decreases until $`r=0`$ is reached, where it “bounces” and then increases towards infinity. The region of the bulk corresponding to any given finite region on the brane evidently has infinite volume. As was mentioned earlier, it is not entirely obvious that infinite volume implies infinite entropy, so we shall give a rough argument that there is indeed cause for concern here. Following Flanagan et al , we shall suppose that the entropy in a region of the bulk is roughly related to the amount of matter \[measured by a suitable integral of $`|T_{ab}k^ak^b|`$\] it contains. From equations 24 and 25 we see that the relevant integral is

$$\frac{3A\beta }{16\pi L^2}_c^{\mathrm{}}\frac{cosh^{\left(\frac{6}{\beta }2\right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})dr}{cosh^{\left(\frac{6}{\beta }\right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})},$$
(26)
where $`A`$ is the three-dimensional “area” of some region on the brane. This is actually finite for $`\beta `$ between 3 and 4, so we see that infinite volume does not necessarily imply an infinite amount of matter. However, realistic values of $`\beta `$ are no larger than about unity, so in the case of real interest to us it would indeed be disastrous if a lightsheet ever extended infinitely far into the bulk. We must show that this cannot happen.

The study of the lightsheets associated with the braneworld is very much simplified by the following simple observation. The metric given by equation 24 may be written as

$$g(NECV)=4^{(2/\beta )}cosh^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})[dsds+\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j],$$
(27)
where $`s`$ is a new coordinate defined by

$$\frac{dr}{ds}=4^{(1/\beta )}cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}).$$
(28)
Evidently the metric is conformally flat. The equation governing the evolution of the shear away from the brane \[see , page 223\],

$$k^a_a\sigma _{bc}=\theta \sigma _{bc}+h_b^dh_c^eC_{jfeg}k^fk^g,$$
(29)
where $`h_b^a`$ is the projection operator and $`C_{abcd}`$ is the Weyl tensor, shows that if the shear vanishes on the brane, then it will vanish everywhere in the bulk. So we can ignore the shear term in the Raychaudhuri equation henceforth.

We now choose two null vectors, $`k^a`$ and $`l^a`$, perpendicular to the brane slice $`r=c`$, $`t=0`$. We take

$$k^t=4^{(1/\beta )}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),k^r=+1,k^x=k^y=k^z=0$$
(30)
and

$$l^t=4^{(1/\beta )}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),l^r=1,l^x=l^y=l^z=0.$$
(31)
Here $`k^a`$ corresponds to a ray of light moving into the bulk in the positive $`r`$ direction. Clearly $`k^al_a=2`$, and the projection operator is

$$h_b^a=diag(\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}0},\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}0},\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}1},\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}1},\mathrm{\hspace{0.25em}1}).$$
(32)
The null extrinsic curvature on the brane is then

$$K_b^a=\frac{1}{L}tanh(\frac{\beta c}{2L})h_b^a,$$
(33)
and the expansion at the brane is

$$\theta (c)=\frac{3}{L}tanh(\frac{\beta c}{2L}).$$
(34)
Now the flat metric

$$dsds+\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j$$
(35)
is obtained from $`g(NECV)`$, as given by equation 27, by means of the conformal transformation with conformal factor $`\mathrm{\Omega }`$ given by

$$\mathrm{\Omega }^2=4^{(2/\beta )}sech^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}).$$
(36)
Therefore the canonical parameter $`\stackrel{~}{\lambda }`$ for null geodesics of the flat metric is obtained \[see , page 446\] from the canonical parameter for null geodesics of $`g(NECV)`$ by means of the simple formula

$$d\stackrel{~}{\lambda }=4^{(2/\beta )}sech^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})d\lambda .$$
(37)
But since the metric 35 is flat, its null geodesics satisfy $`ds/d\stackrel{~}{\lambda }=constant=C^{}`$. Therefore we have

$$\frac{dr}{d\lambda }=\frac{dr}{ds}\frac{ds}{d\stackrel{~}{\lambda }}\frac{d\stackrel{~}{\lambda }}{d\lambda }=(4^{(1/\beta )}cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}))(C^{})(4^{(2/\beta )}sech^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}))=Csech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),$$
(38)
where $`C`$ is a constant.

Now $`\frac{dr}{d\lambda }=k^r=1`$ at the brane, so we have

$$C=cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L}).$$
(39)
Hence

$$\frac{dr}{d\lambda }=cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L}).$$
(40)
Returning now to the Raychaudhuri equation and dropping, as explained, the terms in the vorticity and shear, we have from equation 25

$$\frac{d\theta }{d\lambda }=\frac{1}{3}\theta ^2+\frac{3\beta }{2L^2}sech^2(\frac{\beta r}{2L}),$$
(41)
and combining this with equation 40 we have

$$cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})\frac{d\theta }{dr}=\frac{1}{3}\theta ^2+\frac{3\beta }{2L^2}sech^2(\frac{\beta r}{2L}).$$
(42)
This is the fundamental differential equation governing the evolution of the expansion as we move into the bulk. The initial condition is given by equation 34. Bear in mind that, from equation 24, $`r`$ has a direct metric significance: it measures distances into the bulk from the brane.

Despite the simplicity of its form, equation 42 cannot be solved exactly; a numerical investigation is needed. Extensive trials reveal that the graphs of $`\theta `$ as a function of $`r`$ are always of two types, depending on the position of the brane \[that is, the value of $`c`$.\] The initial value of the slope of $`\theta (r)`$ is given, from equations 34 and 42, by

$$\frac{d\theta }{dr}(c)=\frac{3\beta }{2L^2}[1(1+\frac{2}{\beta })tanh^2(\frac{\beta c}{2L})].$$
(43)
As one might expect, when the brane is relatively far from the throat \[where, it will be remembered, the NEC-violating matter is most concentrated\], then the expansion initially decreases; however, as a ray encounters more of the NEC-violating matter near to the throat, the expansion can begin to increase, or, if $`c`$ is large, remain almost constant for a while. Beyond the throat, however, it declines again, and the result is a caustic: the NEC-violating matter is unable to prevent this in this case. A graph of a typical example of $`\theta (r)`$ is given in Figure 1; notice that $`c`$ has been chosen to be substantially larger than $`L`$, which is what we mean by the brane being “relatively far” from the throat. The value chosen for $`\beta `$, namely unity, corresponds by equation 18 to $`w=4/3`$, a value compatible with the observational data  and also chosen as an illustrative value by Frampton  and by Dabrowski et al .

However, when the brane is relatively near to the throat, $`\theta (r)`$ immediately rises and reaches zero; it continues to increase for a while beyond the throat, before decreasing and tending asymptotically to zero from above. A typical example is shown in Figure 2, below: here $`c<L`$.

In both cases, the lightsheet terminates at a finite value of $`r`$, that is, at a finite distance from the braneworld. In no case does the lightsheet extend infinitely far into the bulk.

It would appear, then, that the NEC is \[in this special case\] not needed to ensure the finiteness of the entropy; the entropy on all lightsheets is finite, even though the NEC is violated everywhere in the bulk. The obvious next question is: is the entropy bound satisfied? However, now that we have established that the “holographic domain” \[see below\] of our brane is in fact always finite, another, even more basic question arises. We have to check that a holographic formulation of this situation is internally consistent.

## 4. The Bousso-Randall Consistency Condition

If we consider the case illustrated in Figure 1, we see that there is a brane at $`r=1.5`$, and a caustic on the other side of the throat, at about $`r=2.2`$. Let us call this value $`b`$. The region corresponding to values of $`r`$ between the brane and the caustic is called  the holographic domain of the brane: it is the part of the bulk which is related to the brane by holography. \[In situations like the one corresponding to Figure 2, $`b`$ is defined as the value of r where $`\theta =0`$.\] The region beyond the caustic \[or the region where $`\theta =0`$\] is irrelevant to the brane. This led Bousso and Randall to construct a very simple yet stringent consistency check: they point out that this picture of holography can only really make sense if the brane holographic image of a bulk particle “disappears” when the bulk particle leaves the holographic domain. They gave a very elegant demonstration that, in the case of the Karch-Randall brane, the holographic image moves out to the conformal infinity of the $`AdS_4`$ brane precisely when the particle reaches the distance of the caustic \[slightly beyond the throat\] from the brane. Thus the Karch-Randall model passes the consistency check.

The consistency check uses the concept of “causal diamonds”, which is explained very clearly in ; we refer the reader there for the details. Let $`P`$ be a point in the bulk of our NEC-violating spacetime, located at $`r=r(P)`$, and let $`q`$ be a point on the brane which is reached by a ray of light from $`P`$. We think of $`q`$ as the tip of a five-dimensional causal diamond, the intersection of which with the brane should give a four-dimensional causal diamond. The event $`P`$ should correspond to a CFT excitation on the brane having support on the boundary of the four-dimensional causal diamond. Using equation 24, we have, along the null geodesic joining $`P`$ to $`q`$,

$$(dr)^24^{(2/\beta )}cosh^{\left(4/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})(dt)^2=0.$$
(44)
The holographic image of $`P`$ is a thin shell on the brane, of radius given by the distance light can cover in the time taken by the light to travel from $`P`$ to $`q`$. Since the geometry of the brane is Minkowskian, this radius is simply given by integrating $`dt`$ from equation 44 \[while correcting for the fact that the Minkowski coordinates on the brane do not give proper times and distances according to the metric 24\]:

$$R(P)=cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})_c^{r(P)}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})𝑑r.$$
(45)
Bousso and Randall show that the corresponding formula for $`R(P)`$ in the Karch-Randall case diverges precisely when $`r(P)`$ reaches $`b`$, the value of $`r`$ at the edge of the holographic domain. This is the “evanescence of the CFT shell” as the bulk particle leaves the holographic domain of the brane. But here, if $`P`$ moves to the edge, we have

$$R(P_{edge})=cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})_c^bsech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})𝑑r.$$
(46)
and this is always finite. Thus, as the bulk particle moves far beyond the holographic domain of the brane, its “CFT shell” is still very much present on the brane; it shows no sign of disappearing off to the conformal infinity of Minkowski space. To put it another way: one would expect a CFT shell that moves off to Minkowski conformal infinity to correspond to a particle moving beyond a horizon in the bulk, as happens for $`AdS_5`$ when it is foliated by Minkowski slices \[in the familiar Poincaré coordinates\]. But here we have no bulk horizon. In fact, no matter how far into the bulk the particle penetrates, the radius of the CFT shell can never exceed

$$R_{max}=cosh^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta c}{2L})_c^{\mathrm{}}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})𝑑r,$$
(47)
which is finite; for the parameter values given in Figure 1, $`R_{max}`$ is approximately 5.48. A CFT shell of greater radius than this simply has no bulk counterpart, surely as direct a contradiction of holography as one could hope to find.

Bousso and Randall also investigated the fate of a particle which moves beyond the holographic domain of the Karch-Randall brane. They found that shortly before the CFT shell leaves the braneworld, a second CFT shell appears on the surviving half of the $`AdS_5`$ boundary, so the particle already has this CFT shell at infinity when it loses its original CFT shell. \[The particle thus briefly has two CFT shells, a curious fact with no obvious interpretation.\] The holographic domain of the “brane at infinity”, that is, the surviving half of the $`AdS_5`$ boundary, is just the corresponding half of the $`AdS_5`$ bulk. In the present case, the situation is quite different: numerical experimentation strongly suggests that if we push the brane out towards $`r=\mathrm{}`$, then its holographic domain protrudes farther into the region $`r0`$, so that $`b`$ tends to infinity. See for example Figure 3, below, where the brane is at $`r=30`$ and $`b`$ is approximately 23.5. \[It seems that, for large values of $`c`$, $`b`$ is always somewhat smaller than $`c`$ but of the same order of magnitude.\]

Thus, the holographic domain of a braneworld pushed out to $`r=\mathrm{}`$ is the entire bulk. Again, however, there are CFT shells at $`r=\mathrm{}`$ with no bulk counterpart. To see this, recall that there is no metric on this “brane”, only a conformal structure. Choose $`\eta _{ij}dx^idx^j`$ as a representative of this conformal structure, and let $`u`$ be the corresponding radial coordinate $`(x^2+y^2+z^2)^{1/2}`$. \[The reader should think of $`u`$ as nothing more than a coordinate which distinguishes points on the boundary but which has no meaning as a “radius”.\] The value of this coordinate for the CFT shell of a particle at $`r=r(P)`$ is just

$$u(P)=_{\mathrm{}}^{r(P)}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})𝑑r,$$
(48)
and again this is strictly finite, even if $`r(P)`$ tends to infinity. Again, no CFT shell at $`r=\mathrm{}`$ which corresponds to values of $`u`$ greater than $`_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}sech^{\left(2/\beta \right)}(\frac{\beta r}{2L})𝑑r`$ has any bulk counterpart. Of course all this applies equally to the “brane” at $`r=+\mathrm{}`$, and so we obtain a picture of the “global holography”  of this spacetime as follows. Any particle anywhere in the bulk is always associated with two CFT shells, one on the braneworld, and one at $`r=+\mathrm{}`$. The particle is always in the holographic domain of $`r=+\mathrm{}`$, but it can leave the holographic domain of the braneworld; however, nothing in particular happens to the CFT shells when this occurs. No CFT shell ever approaches the boundary of either the brane at $`r=c`$ or the one at $`r=+\mathrm{}`$, and there are “infinitely large” regions of both branes which have no bulk counterpart. Certainly no CFT shell ever crosses from one brane to the other, as happens in the Karch-Randall case: the two branes are disconnected in this sense.

In short, we can say that this spacetime is profoundly “anti-holographic”. A particle not in the holographic domain of the braneworld, which contributes nothing to the entropy on the brane lightsheets, is nevertheless detected by the CFT on the brane. On the other hand, there are infinitely many CFT shells, both on the braneworld and at $`r=+\mathrm{}`$, which correspond to nothing whatever in the bulk. If holography is correct, these are simply internal inconsistencies. Holography completely forbids a situation like this to arise.

## 5. Conclusion

It is difficult to over-state the importance of the cosmological NEC. If indeed $`w<1`$, then we may have to adapt ourselves to thinking of the Universe as an intrinsically unstable system, just as an earlier generation had to learn to think of the Universe as being dynamic rather than static. Furthermore, it is not easy to reconcile a violation of the NEC with basic physical principles: if $`w<1`$, then matter on the largest scales is governed by radically new physics . The fate of the entire Universe could be controlled by quantum-gravitational effects acting not in the deep past, but in the here and now . The Universe may be fated to end, not in a Crunch but in a Smash  \[that is, a final singularity in which the cosmological scale factor tends to infinity in a finite proper time.\]

Alternatively, it may be  that the Universe does not violate the NEC. If so, the fact remains  that it comes perilously close to doing so, and it is essential to understand what prevents values of $`w`$ close to $`1`$ from becoming values slightly less than $`1`$. It may seem a great extrapolation to conclude from the example studied here that it is holography that plays this role. However, we wish to draw attention not just to the fact that holography forbids violations of the NEC in this particular example, but also to the way in which the prohibition is expressed. Holography, in this example, does not just predict something strange when NEC-violating matter is introduced into $`AdS_5`$: in fact, it fails to predict anything at all; it becomes completely incoherent; it claims both that the brane is aware of an excitation beyond the edge of the lightsheet, and that it is not. It may help to compare this with classical General Relativity. If we introduce unusual forms of matter into Minkowski space, then the theory may predict very strange spacetime structure. But if we tried to claim that we had introduced into Minkowski space a form of matter which is not locally conserved, then General Relativity tells us nothing, because of the Bianchi identities. The situation that results when NEC-violating matter is introduced into $`AdS_5`$ is similar.

This suggests to us that holography forbids all violations of the cosmological version of the NEC. \[Note that it was pointed out in  that the entropy bound can be used to replace energy conditions in cosmology. The present claim may be regarded as an attempt to explain that observation.\] To prove this, one would have to consider NEC-violating matter with a general equation of state: that is, one would have to allow $`w`$ to depend on position. Further work is needed on this problem, but it seems implausible that this will materially change our conclusions. It is hard to believe that tinkering with $`w`$ will cause $`R_{max}`$ \[given by equation 47\] to become infinite, as it must if all CFT shells on the braneworld are to have holographic partners. Intuitively, the conflict with holography arises from the tendency of NEC-violating spacetimes to “flare out” in the manner of a wormhole , and we therefore expect the pathologies we have seen in this example to persist for any NEC-violating bulk. If this is so, then astrophysical analyses of the value of $`w`$ are direct observational tests of holography, which apparently predicts that $`w1`$.

## Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to Dr Lin Ping for help with the numerical analysis of equation 42, and to Soon Wanmei for helpful discussions.


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# Flame Enhancement and Quenching in Fluid Flows

## I Introduction

Turbulent combustion in premixed flows is a widely studied topic in both scientific and industrial settings (see e.g. bray-peters94 ; Ronney ; Peters ). The interest in the subject is due to an important influence that advection can have on the reaction process: both experimental bradley92 ; SRBY  and theoretical CW ; clavin-williams82 ; williams85 ; anand-pope87 ; yakhot88 ; kerstein88 ; poinsot-veynante-candel90 ; aldredge95 ; echekki-chen96 ; echekki-chen99  work shows that the propagation speed of the flame can be significantly altered by the fluid flow. Specifically, moderately intense levels of turbulence have the tendency to accelerate the flame speed $`v`$ beyond its laminar value $`v_{}`$. The mechanism and the extent of the flame acceleration depend on the particular regime of burning borghi85 . The general reason for the enhancement is that the fluid motion distorts the flame front, increasing the reaction area. On the other hand, if the advection is too strong, it can lead to the flame extinction. The critical strength of advection which leads to quenching depends on the extent of the flame, strength of reaction and diffusion, and properties of the flow.

At this stage, it is unreasonable to expect a complete analytical theory describing the process of combustion in a fluid phase. Indeed, detailed modelling of the phenomena involves solving a reaction-diffusion system involving temperature (or energy) and concentrations of reactants coupled with compressible Navier-Stokes equations describing motion of the mixture Peters ; ZBLM . Therefore, most of the studies in this field which seek analytical conclusions use heuristic reasoning or simplified models, which may approximately describe the system in certain combustion regimes. Some of the combustion regimes are relatively well-understood, such as the so-called flamelet regime, where flame thickness is small compared to the fluid velocity scales. The geometric optics approximation where the propagation of the front is ruled by Huygens principle is often used as a starting point in the analysis of this regime (see e.g. Pel ; kerstein-ashurst-williams88 ).

Our goal here is to study one of the most widely used PDE models of combustion, namely the scalar reaction-diffusion equation with passive advection:

$$\frac{T}{t}+𝐮T=\kappa ^2T+\frac{1}{\tau }R(T).$$
(1)
Here $`T`$ is the normalized temperature, $`0T1`$, $`𝐮`$ is the fluid velocity, which we assume is incompressible, $`\kappa `$ is thermal diffusivity, and $`\tau `$ is the typical reaction time. In the absence of fluid velocity Eq. (1) admits flat propagation front with laminar burning velocity of the order of $`v_{}\sqrt{\kappa /\tau }`$ and characteristic thickness of the order of $`\delta \sqrt{\kappa \tau }`$. The model (1) can be derived from a more complete system under assumptions of constant density and unity Lewis number (the ratio of material and temperature diffusivity), as shown, for instance, in CW . The equation (1) has a more general applicability than the geometrical optics approximation; moreover, as we will discuss below, the geometrical optics limit can be obtained from (1) in a certain parameter range.

We will consider reaction rates $`R(T)`$ of two types, KPP (Kolmogorov, Petrovskii, Piskunov) KPP ; Fisher , and ignition. The KPP type is characterized by the condition that the function $`R(T)`$ is positive and convex on the interval $`0<T<1`$. This reaction type is used often in problems on population dynamics (see e.g. AW1 ; Fi ), but is relevant in combustion modelling, for example in some autocatalyctic reactions HSS . A reaction term of ignition type is characterized by the presence of critical ignition temperature, such that the function $`R(T)`$ is identically zero below ignition temperature. This type of reaction term is used widely to model combustion processes (see e.g. VVV ; ZBLM ), in particular approximating the behavior of Arrhenius-type chemical reactions which vanish rapidly as temperature approaches zero.

Our main goal is to gain insight into the question of how the geometry and the amplitude of the fluid flow influence the combustion process. Our study is partly motivated by recent analytical work ABP ; CKOR ; CKR ; HPS ; KR  where rigorous bounds on combustion enhancement and quenching are proved. We test the sharpness of results in ABP ; CKOR ; CKR ; HPS ; KR , and in addition derive new predictions. We consider two classes of flows. The first is shear flows, a representative of a wider class of flows, called ”percolating” in CKOR , which have open streamlines connecting distant regions of the fluid. The second class is cellular flow, where the streamlines are closed and the flow consists of isolated cells. For each class of flows, we study both flame enhancement and quenching.

For flame enhancement study, we consider initial temperature in the form of the laminar front, with $`T=1`$ in the semi-infinite region behind the front and $`T=0`$ in the the semi-infinite region ahead of the front. Distorted by imposed flow, the flame front propagates as a travelling wave with velocity higher than laminar. The goal of the flame enhancement study is to obtain relations between flame propagation speed $`v`$ and the properties of the flow, especially for the large advection velocities.

In the case of quenching phenomena, we consider initial temperature to be non-zero in a finite region. Since quenching cannot occur for the KPP-type source term Roq ; Roq-2 , we use the ignition-type reaction term. As shown by Kanel, there is a critical size $`W_{}`$ of initial hot region below which the flame will be extinguished by diffusion alone, e.g. with no advection, when the temperature drops below the threshold and reaction ceases before the flame establishes a steady travelling wave configuration Kanel . When advection is present, the fluid flow stretches the initially hot region so that it can be quenched by diffusion; hot regions of the size much larger than $`W_{}`$ can be quenched in this manner. Our goal has been to understand how the geometry and amplitude of the flow influence the size of the band $`W`$ of the initial hot region that can be quenched.

## II Numerical Setup and Method

The simulation is set in two space dimensions, in a vertical strip of width $`L`$ with periodic boundary conditions in $`x`$ direction (Fig. 1). In reaction enhancement studies, the initial temperature was set to $`T=1`$ in the lower half of the domain and to $`T=0`$ in the upper half of the domain. In the quenching studies the initial temperature was set to $`T=1`$ in a horizontal band of width $`W`$ in the center of the domain, and to $`T=0`$ elsewhere. The interfaces between hot and cold fluid were smoothed to match the laminar flame thickness.

We consider two types of flows, sinusoidal shear flow with amplitude $`U`$ and wavelength $`L`$, perpendicular to the initial temperature front(s),

$$𝐮=U(0,\mathrm{cos}\frac{2\pi x}{L}),$$
(2)
and cellular flow with amplitude $`U`$ and wavelength $`L`$,

$$𝐮=U(\mathrm{sin}\frac{2\pi x}{L}\mathrm{cos}\frac{2\pi y}{L},\mathrm{cos}\frac{2\pi x}{L}\mathrm{sin}\frac{2\pi y}{L}).$$
(3)
In the quenching simulations, the size of the cell $`L/2`$ was a fraction of $`W`$, so that the initial band always contains integer number of cells.

Most of the reaction enhancement computations were done using KPP reaction rate KPP ; Fisher  in the advection-reaction-diffusion equation (1),

$$R(T)=\frac{1}{4}T(1T),$$
(4)
with some of the simulations repeated with ignition type reaction,

$$R(T)=\frac{T_{}}{(1T_{})^2}(1T),T>T_{},$$
(5)
where $`T_{}`$ represents threshold temperature, below which $`R(T)=0`$. In quenching studies we use ignition type reaction (5) with threshold temperature $`T_{}=0.5`$. Both reaction rates (4) and (5) were chosen to exactly match, in the absence of advection, laminar burning velocity $`v_{}=\sqrt{\kappa /\tau }`$. The corresponding laminar flame thickness is in both cases of the order of $`\delta =\sqrt{\kappa \tau }`$; for KPP reaction it is several times wider than for ignition.

Equation (1) with reaction rates (4) and (5) has been solved using a fourth-order explicit finite difference scheme in space and a third-order Adams-Bashforth integration in time. The grid size was chosen so as to accurately represent the shear across the reacting region: typically of the order of 12 zones across the flame interface for thin fronts and at least 32 zones per period for thick fronts. The computational domain extended a considerable distance upstream and downstream from the burning front so that boundary effects were negligible. In flame enhancement simulations the overall grid was remapped following the propagation of the front, thereby allowing for long integration periods — of the order of 1000 reaction times $`\tau `$. We found that these long integrations were necessary in order to reproduce correctly the asymptotic behavior of the propagation speed in the case of strong advection.

As a measure of the reaction enhancement we use the bulk burning rate

$`v(t)`$ $`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{L}}{\displaystyle _0^L}{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}}{\displaystyle \frac{T(x,y,t)}{t}}𝑑y𝑑x`$ (6)
$`=`$ $`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{\tau L}}{\displaystyle _0^L}{\displaystyle _{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}}R(T)𝑑y𝑑x.`$
The second equality in (6) can be justified by integration by parts. The bulk burning rate coincides with the front velocity in a case where the solution is a travelling wave, but provides a more flexible measure of combustion. Physically, $`v(t)`$ can be understood as the total amount of reacted material or the total heat production. In all simulations done for reaction enhancement, $`v(t)`$ approaches an asymptotic value (for cellular flows one should average in time to arrive at this value) and we denote this asymptotic value $`v`$.

We remark that in shear and cellular flows equation (1) admits travelling wave-type solutions, called pulsating fronts (see e.g. B ; BLL ; BH ; Xin1 ; Xin2 ). A rigorous stability theory for these solutions exists but is not complete (see Xin3  for a recent review). Except when quenching occurs, in our simulations we always observed convergence of the solution to such waves, so the bounds on $`v`$ also provide bounds for the propagation speeds of pulsating fronts.

In the quenching studies, we measure the total amount of burned material per wavelength,

$$w(t)=\frac{1}{L}_0^L_{\mathrm{}}^{\mathrm{}}T(x,y)𝑑y𝑑x,$$
(7)
which can also be interpreted as the width of the non-perturbed horizontal band with temperature $`T=1`$ surrounded by the fluid with $`T=0`$. This quantity is related to the bulk burning rate per interface, $`v(t)=\dot{w}(t)`$. Depending on initial conditions and flow parameters, $`w(t)`$ either approaches an asymptotic value, e.g. $`v(t)0`$, or increases with constant rate, that is $`v(t)v`$ (for cellular flow, in the time-averaged sense). In the first case we say that flame quenches; the main objective of quenching simulations is to determine under which conditions this happens.

## III Shear flow: Reaction Enhancement

We carried out simulations with the sinusoidal shear flow with amplitude flow $`U`$, and wavelength, $`L`$, given by Eq. (2). In this section we are interested only in reaction enhancement phenomena, and therefore for initial conditions we consider $`T=1`$ in the semi-infinite domain $`y<0`$, and $`T=0`$ for $`y>0`$. We carried out computations for both KPP and ignition type reactions, but did not find significant differences in the qualitative behavior. The numerical results presented in this section are obtained with KPP reaction term (4).

Of special interest is the dependence of the effective propagation rate $`v`$ on the velocity amplitude, $`U`$, and wavelength, $`L`$, which defines the characteristic length scale of the flow (Fig. 2). For small amplitudes, $`Uv_{}`$, our results are in agreement with the quadratic law $`vv_{}+cU^2`$, which goes back to Clavin and Williams CW  for turbulent flow and has been recently proved rigorously for shear flows in HPS . We did not study this regime in detail since our main interest is in the strong advection case.

For the amplitudes $`Uv_{}`$ the results are in good agreement with the linear law $`v=aU+b,`$ where the coefficients $`a`$ and $`bv_{}`$ depend on the geometry of the flow. In the situation where the scale of the flow is much larger than the reaction length scale, $`L\delta `$, our data agrees with $`v=U+v_{}.`$ This law has been proposed in ABP  for shear flows which vary slowly compared to the typical reaction length and rigorously proved in CKR  under similar assumptions. For any fluid flow, the regime $`L\delta `$ is closely related to the so-called geometrical optics combustion regime Ronney , the limit where reaction time and length scales approach zero. In the framework of the equation (1) this corresponds to the limit $`\kappa ,\tau 0`$ while $`\kappa /\tau `$ remains constant. Indeed, by rescaling equation (1) with a factor $`L/\delta `$ in space and time, we find that the bulk burning rate $`v`$ for the original equation (1) is the same as for equation with modified diffusion and reaction (8)

$$T_t+𝐮T\kappa \frac{\delta }{L}\mathrm{\Delta }T=\frac{L}{\delta \tau }R(T).$$
(8)
As $`L`$ grows, equation (8) approaches the geometrical optics limit.

Quite often, front propagation in the thin front and fast reaction limit is modelled by Hamilton-Jacobi type equations. One such model is the $`G`$-equation

$$G_t+𝐮G=v_{}|G|,$$
(9)
where the front is defined by a constant level surface of the scalar $`G`$ (see e.g. Pel ). The $`G`$-equation describes propagation of the front according to Huygens principle; that is, the front (i) is transported by fluid flow, and (ii) propagates normal to itself with the speed $`v_{}`$. The law $`v=U+v_{}`$ can also be understood from the point of view of geometrical optics since it is easily derived from the $`G`$-equation. Recently Majda and Souganidis pointed out that the $`G`$-equation does not provide the geometrical optics limit of the reaction diffusion equation (8) in a precise sense MS1 ; EMS . However the rigorous bounds derived for the true effective equation still give the same prediction for $`v`$ in the case of shear flow MS1 .

In the situation where $`L`$ becomes comparable to $`\delta `$, the coefficient proportionality $`a`$ between velocity amplitude and flame propagation rate is no longer equal to unity. The rigorous lower bound for $`v`$ from KR  takes form $`vC_1U\frac{1}{1+C_2n}`$, where $`n=2\pi \delta /L.`$ This bound is in good qualitative agreement with an argument proposed by Abel, Celani, Verni and Vulpiani ACVV1  based on the effective diffusivity for the shear flow. It is well known that, if the problem is considered on sufficiently large time and length scales, the effect of the advection of passive diffusive scalar can often be modelled by effective diffusivity AMa ; AVer . The expression of effective diffusivity in a strong shear flow goes back to Taylor Taylor , $`\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}=\kappa +\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{U}{v_{}m}\right)^2\kappa `$, where $`m=2\pi \delta /l`$ and $`l`$ is the typical length scale of the flow. In the presence of reaction, we take $`l=\mathrm{min}(\delta ,L),`$ since the advection balances with reaction instead of diffusion if $`L>\delta `$. This leads to the qualitative prediction $`vU`$ if $`L\delta `$ and $`vUL/\delta `$ if $`L\delta `$. We obtained good although not perfect agreement with this prediction. This is not surprising given the heuristic derivation of the expression for the effective diffusivity and its possible dependence on more subtle geometric properties of the flow.

Additional understanding of linear dependence $`v(U)`$ can be gained from studying the relationship between the burning enhancement and the structure of the front, in particular level sets of the temperature. Assume that in the geometrical optics approximation the front is given by the function $`y=f(x)`$; then for the travelling wave obeying Huygens principle and propagating with speed $`v`$, we have

$$v=u(x)+v_{}\sqrt{1+(f^{})^2},$$

where $`u(x)`$ is profile of the shear, $`u(x)=U\mathrm{cos}\frac{2\pi x}{L}`$. In the case where $`u`$ is a mean zero flow, this leads to the expression

$$v=\frac{v_{}}{L}_0^L\sqrt{1+(f^{})^2}𝑑x.$$
(10)
Thus, we obtain a well-known fact that the speed of propagation is proportional to the area of the front which in geometrical optics limit coincides with a level set of $`T`$ (see Fig. 3 for a picture of level sets in a situation close to geometrical optics). It is interesting to test to what extent this relationship remains true in the situations where geometrical optics regime is no longer valid, for example when $`L`$ is comparable to $`\delta `$. We found that for large $`U`$, there is still good agreement between the elongation factor of the level sets of temperature and combustion enhancement (Fig. 4). Moreover, we found that for large $`U`$ the temperature distribution across the front scales with the shear amplitude (see Fig. 5), providing another explanation of the linear dependence of the bulk burning rate on the amplitude of the flow. This scaling behavior can be understood in terms of the approximate self-similarity of equation (1) with respect to the change of variables $`\stackrel{~}{y}=\frac{y/\delta }{U/v_{}}`$, $`\stackrel{~}{x}=x/\delta `$, $`\stackrel{~}{t}=t/\tau `$, which gives

$$\frac{T}{\stackrel{~}{t}}+\mathrm{cos}\left(\frac{2\pi x}{L}\right)\frac{T}{\stackrel{~}{y}}=\frac{^2T}{\stackrel{~}{x}^2}+\left(\frac{v_{}}{U}\right)^2\frac{^2T}{\stackrel{~}{y}^2}+R(T).$$
(11)
The only term which now depends on $`U`$ is the one proportional to the second derivative in $`\stackrel{~}{y},`$ and it becomes negligible in the limit of large $`U`$. Indeed, equation (11) without this term is hypoelliptic, and so addition of the second derivative term does not constitute a singular perturbation. That leads to $`U`$-independent propagation rate $`\stackrel{~}{v}\frac{v}{U}=\stackrel{~}{v}(L)`$ and to linear proportionality $`vU`$ for large $`U/v_{}`$.

We conclude this section by a remark that understanding of the combustion enhancement in a shear flow appears to be useful in some situations where flows with different structure are involved. In particular, in the reactive Boussinesq system the flow consists of vortices moving along with the reaction front VR? . However in the frame moving with the front the effect of such vortical flow is similar to the shear. The prediction for the reaction enhancement in such system based on the results for the shear flows appears to be in agreement with numerically observed behavior VR? .

## IV Cellular flow: Reaction Enhancement

Cellular flows have been studied by many authors (see e.g. Chandra ; DR ), since similar fluid motions appear in many important applications; classical examples are the two-dimensional rolls of the Rayleigh-Bénard problem and Taylor vortices in Couette flow.

For cellular flow simulations, we use a velocity field given by Eq. (3). The flow is controlled by two parameters, velocity amplitude $`U`$ and wavelength $`L`$. As in simulations of reaction enhancement by shear flow, we consider initial conditions with $`T=0`$ in the upper half of the computational domain ($`y<0`$), and $`T=1`$ in the lower half ($`y>0`$). Most of the results presented in this section were obtained with KPP reaction term (4); the influence of the reaction type on the reaction enhancement is discussed at the end of this section.

There are several regimes, which can be classified according to the relations between the characteristic scales present in the problem. There are three characteristic time scales: advection, $`\tau _U=L/U`$; reaction, $`\tau _R=\tau `$; and diffusion, $`\tau _D=L^2/\kappa `$. In this paper, we mostly studied two regimes: $`\tau _U\tau _R\tau _D`$ and $`\tau _R\tau _U\tau _D`$. The first is the regime of strong advection; in the second regime advection can be very strong as well, but is compensated by large cell size $`L,`$ so that the reactive time scale becomes the fastest in the problem. If $`\tau _D\tau _R`$, or equivalently, $`L\delta `$, we have diffusive or small cell regime. The remaining regime corresponds to $`\tau _R\tau _D\tau _U,`$ and therefore $`Uv_{}`$. Hence we have slow advection; this situation is of less interest to us since $`vU+v_{}`$ under very general conditions CKOR , so the effect of the advection on the propagation speed is minor.

In the regime $`\tau _R\tau _U\tau _D`$ our simulations show good agreement with geometrical optics models. In Figure 7 we show a typical picture of flame in the regime close to geometrical optics. The $`G`$-equation, (9), which is closely related to geometrical optics regime, is invariant under simultaneous rescaling of time and space by the same factor. This suggests that for flames approaching the geometrical optics limit, one should observe this similarity, and indeed we do as shown in Fig. 7. The earliest prediction of the front propagation speed in a cellular flow for large $`U`$ within the geometrical optics framework appears to be due to Shy, Ronney, Buckley and Yakhot SRBY . Using heuristic reasoning, they proposed that $`vU/\mathrm{log}(U/v_{})`$ if one considers front advancing according to Huygens principle. The same law is proposed in ACVV2  based on more detailed analysis. To illustrate the origin of this law, let us sketch an argument providing the lower bound for $`v.`$ Let us look at the propagation of the flame tip along the path ABCDE on the Fig. 8. Assuming that at every point of ABCDE the flame velocity is given by $`u(x,y)+v_{},`$ and integrating in time, we obtain a lower bound

$$\frac{v}{v_{}}\frac{\pi }{4}\frac{\sqrt{\left(\frac{U}{v_{}}\right)^21}}{\mathrm{log}\left(\frac{U}{v_{}}+\sqrt{\left(\frac{U}{v_{}}\right)^21}\right)}.$$
(12)
This lower bound, when doubled, gives a very good fit to our numerical data and is represented by a solid line in Fig. 9. As one can see in Fig. 7, the tip of the flame follows the path close to ABCDE, but avoiding corners; this may account as a factor for the difference in speed compared with the lower bound. Our results in the geometrical optics regime agree with results of ACVV2 ; however we stress that our simulation was carried out for the reaction-diffusion equation (1) using the same numerical scheme in all regimes, while ACVV2  uses a different model in geometrical optics limit. We remark that in ACVV1 ; ACVV2  the possibility of the regime, where $`\tau _R\tau _U`$ and $`v`$ behaves as $`U^{3/4}`$, was proposed. We could not definitively confirm existence of such a regime due to the closeness of $`(U/v_{})^{3/4}`$ and $`(U/v_{})/\mathrm{log}(U/v_{})`$ curves in the range of tested parameters (Fig. 9).

It should be emphasized that the geometrical optics regime requires not only the thin front assumption, $`L\delta `$, but also fast reaction in comparison with advection, $`\tau _R\tau _U`$; in other words, velocity must be limited by $`U(L/\delta )v_{}`$. When this restriction is broken we observe significant decrease in flame propagation speed compared to the geometrical optics prediction (Fig. 9). Figure 10 further illustrates this point, showing that on a logarithmic scale, there is a marked change in the slope of $`(v/v_{})`$ as a function of $`U`$ as $`\tau _R/\tau _U`$ increases. When $`\tau _U`$ exceeds $`\tau _R`$, we observe power-law, $`vU^{1/4}`$, as proposed by Audoly, Berestycki and Pomeau ABP , and confirmed in ACVV2  in a narrower range of parameters. The measurement of the slope $`1/4`$ was sufficiently precise to distinguish it from the $`vU^{1/5}`$ behavior, a lower bound rigorously proved in KR . The observed $`vU^{1/4}`$ scaling extends to the limit of cell sizes small in comparison with the laminar thickness, $`L\delta `$. We remark that the laminar front thickness for the KPP reaction is of the order of $`16\delta `$ which is large compared to smallest cell size $`L/2=4\delta `$ shown in Fig. 10; limited data available for $`L/\delta =4,2`$ (shown in Fig. 11) also confirms the $`vU^{1/4}`$ scaling. In the very small cell regime, the $`vU^{1/4}`$ scaling was rigorously proven in HPS  using homogenization approach.

We also studied the dependence of $`v`$ on the cell size while $`U/v_{}`$ is fixed. Figure 12 shows changes in the structure of the flame with the increase of the cell size — from a more diffusive front to a front approaching geometrical optics behavior. The flame propagation speed, normalized by $`(U/v_{})^{1/4}`$ factor, is presented in Fig. 11. As $`L/\delta `$ increases, we see the transition from the $`\tau _U\tau _R`$ regime, to the geometrical optics, where flame propagation speed is independent of cell size. For $`\tau _U\tau _R`$ the data collapse to a single curve, suggesting the power scaling with $`L/\delta `$, with power changing from $`1/4`$ for small $`L/\delta `$ to $`3/4`$ for large $`L/\delta `$. The resulting scaling can be summarized as,

$`v/v_{}`$ $``$ $`(U/v_{})/\mathrm{log}(U/v_{}),\tau _R\tau _U\tau _D,`$ (13)
$`v/v_{}`$ $``$ $`(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{3/4},\tau _U\tau _R\tau _D.`$ (14)
$`v/v_{}`$ $``$ $`(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{1/4},\tau _U\tau _D\tau _R,`$ (15)
To explain observed the flame propagation speed, let us consider a model based on the effective diffusivity, proposed by Audoly, Berestycki and Pomeau ABP . When velocity is high, $`\tau _U\tau _R`$, the sharp temperature gradients appear in the narrow boundary layer at cell borders (Fig. 13). The thickness of the boundary layer, $`h`$, is determined by the balance of diffusion and advection, $`\kappa /h^2=U/L`$, and is much smaller than $`\delta `$,

$$h\sqrt{\kappa L/U}.$$
(16)
(This argument is a concise, naive version of the considerations appearing in the derivation of the effective diffusivity in cellular flow, Childress ; YPP ; Shraiman ; RBDH .)

A discrete diffusion equation modelling the original equation (1) has been suggested in ACVV1 ; ACVV2 :

$$\frac{\theta _n}{t}=\frac{\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}}{L^2}\left[\theta _{n1}2\theta _n+\theta _{n+1}\right]+\frac{1}{\tau }R(\theta _n).$$
(17)
Here $`\theta _n`$ is the average temperature in the $`n`$-th cell; and $`\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is effective diffusivity

$$\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}=\kappa L/h.$$
(18)
This leads to the propagation rate,

$$v=\sqrt{\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}/\tau }v_{}\sqrt{L/h},$$

and, taking into account Eq. (16), to the scaling (15). We found that the prediction for speed given by (17) agrees with numerical simulations only if $`L\delta .`$

For large cell sizes, $`L\delta `$, the diffusive model (17) no longer accounts fully for the flame propagation process. The main objection to the model is that (17) assumes temperature is uniform inside the cell, and the reaction term can be estimated at the average cell temperature. However the numerically observed behavior demonstrates at first sharp temperature gradients at the border of the cell, later evolving into flame propagation inside of the cell roughly at the laminar flame speed (see Fig. 13 for the structure of the front inside cells). Indeed, the cellular flow has no efficient mechanism for mixing between the streamlines, and the diffusion time scale in that direction is of the order $`L^2/\kappa `$ (practically not enhanced) RY . Therefore the combustion process inside the cell takes time of the order of $`L/v_{}`$, rather then $`\delta /v_{}`$ (which corresponds to substituting the average temperature into the reaction term).

Here, we will modify the effective diffusivity model (17) to account for slower burning inside large cells. As in the case of small cells, the flame propagation from one cell to another is enhanced because of the high temperature gradient in the boundary layer with width given by expression (16). The heat coming to the cell through the cell boundary is distributed on the scale of $`\delta `$ (as opposed to $`L`$, in the case of small $`L`$). We further notice that due to the fast advection, the temperature is essentially equal along the streamlines inside the cell (see Fig. 12), which allows the flame to propagate directly from one boundary layer to another (Fig. 13). That allows us to write the discrete diffusion equation similar to (17), but replacing averaging in the cell by the averaging in the strip of width $`\delta `$ along the cell border ($`\delta `$-layer),

$$\frac{\theta _n}{t}=\frac{\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}}{\delta ^2}\left[\theta _{n1}2\theta _n+\theta _{n+1}\right]+\frac{1}{\tau }R(\theta _n).$$
(19)
Here $`\theta _n`$ is the average of the temperature in the $`\delta `$-layer of the $`n`$-th cell; and $`\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}`$ is effective diffusivity,

$$\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}=\kappa \delta /h.$$
(20)
The temperature in a laminar front varies on the scale $`\delta ,`$ and so estimating reaction in a $`\delta `$-layer by $`R(\theta _n)`$ is justified. Equation (19) does not take into account the heat flux from the $`\delta `$-layer to the bulk of the cell. However, since $`h\delta ,`$ this heat flux does not enter the main balance. In other words, the front described by (19) propagates entirely in the $`\delta `$-layers, with the rate $`v_\delta =\sqrt{\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}/\tau }v_{}\sqrt{\delta /h}.`$ Substituting $`h`$ from Eq. (16) we obtain,

$$v_\delta v_{}(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{1/4}.$$
(21)
The time needed to ignite a new cell, e.g. to warm up a layer of the size of the order $`\delta `$ in that cell, is equal to $`\tau _\delta =\delta /v_\delta .`$ Once the width of a warmed up layer reaches size of the order of $`\delta `$, reaction becomes capable of sustaining the temperature. Further propagation of the flame corresponds to the basically laminar front movement inside the cell, and takes time $`\tau _{\mathrm{cell}}L/v_{}`$.

The total bulk burning rate $`v`$ is of the order of $`v_{}`$ times the number of burning cells, which can be estimated as the ratio of the cell burning time, $`\tau _{\mathrm{cell}}L/v_{}`$, to the time needed to ignite a cell, $`\tau _\delta =\delta /v_\delta `$. Therefore the bulk burning rate is obtained by multiplying the number of burning cells with $`v_{},`$ or essentially by normalizing $`v_\delta `$ with a factor of $`L/\delta `$,

$$vv_{}\frac{\tau _{\mathrm{cell}}}{\tau _\delta }\frac{L}{\delta }v_\delta v_{}(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{3/4},$$

which agrees with numerically observed scaling (14).

Finally, we would like to mention the effect of the reaction rate. Similar to the shear flow, we found that the reaction type does not influence asymptotic scaling laws like (15) or (14), although there is certainly a difference in the constant factors. However, in cellular flows there is an interesting phenomenon which is present for ignition-type but not KPP reactions. The dependence $`v(U)`$ is always monotone increasing in the KPP case, but it may exhibit a temporary reversal for ignition-type reactions (Fig. 14). This effect has been discovered by Kagan and Sivashinsky KS  and further studied in KRS . We found that this phenomenon is more pronounced when the reaction threshold $`T_{}`$ is closer to unity, in agreement with the arguments of KRS .

## V Quenching

In this section we address another effect that advection can have on the combustion process — quenching. We say that reaction is quenched if the average temperature goes to zero uniformly with time. Quenching occurs in the systems with ignition type reaction when, due to diffusion and advection, temperature drops below the ignition threshold everywhere and the integrated reaction rate becomes identically zero.

If the size of the region is small enough quenching can be caused by diffusion alone, e.g. without advection, as shown by Kanel Kanel . Kanel considered the one-dimensional reaction-diffusion equation $`T_t\kappa T_{xx}=\tau ^1R(T)`$. He found that there exist two critical sizes $`W_{}W_{}^{}`$ such that if the initial size of the hot region (where $`T=1`$) is smaller than $`W_{},`$ reaction quenches, while if the initial size of the hot region is greater than $`W_{}^{}`$, two fronts form and propagate in opposite directions. Two different critical sizes are likely an artifact of the proof; in our simulations, we always found $`W_{}=W_{}^{}\delta `$ and will refer to the single critical size $`W_{}.`$ In two and three dimensions, the presence of advection may lead to stretching of the initial hot spot, thus making diffusion more efficient at cooling, and consequently, at quenching.

In our numerical simulations we study quenching under the influence of advection, in particular in shear and cellular flows. As in previous sections, the prescribed flow velocities are defined by Eq. (2) for shear flow and by Eq. (3) for cellular flow. For all simulations we used the ignition-type reaction (5) with threshold $`T_{}=1/2`$, since quenching cannot occur for the KPP-type source term Roq ; Roq-2 . As the initial conditions we use a horizontal band of width $`W`$ with temperature above critical ($`T=1`$) within the band and with temperature below critical ($`T=0`$) outside the band.

The typical evolution of the system described above is shown in Fig. 15. We found that the temperature distribution in both for shear and cellular flows evolves according to one of the two possible scenarios, depending on the amplitude of the advection velocity. For lower advection velocities, after an initial transient period, the system develops solution characterized by a wide, steadily growing burned region between two wrinkled fronts propagating in opposite directions. These fronts are exactly as described in the preceding sections with regard to structure, speed, and dependence on the flow properties $`U`$ and $`L`$. For higher advection velocities, the temperature eventually drops below $`T_{}`$ everywhere, after which no burning occurs. We denote by $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ the value of advection velocity which triggers the system between these two scenarios (further we refer to them as burning and quenching), and establish the relation between $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ and the initial conditions and structure of the flow.

We measure the critical value of velocity amplitude $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}(L,W)`$ using the following procedure. For each combination of the initial hot band size $`W`$ and velocity period $`L`$, we execute a number of simulations for different velocity amplitudes $`U`$. For each simulation we measured the total amount of burned material per period $`w(t)`$, defined by Eq. (7), as a function of time (shown in Fig. 16). The burning systems (with higher velocities, where two front are formed) are characterized in Fig. 16 by constant, non-zero slopes, corresponding to constant reaction rate. These rates are independent of initial conditions, and are equal to double the burning rate $`v(U,L)`$, since there are two fronts. The quenched systems are characterized by evolving to constant $`w(t)`$. Both formation of steady fronts and quenched solutions requires some transition time.

The summary of results for a sinusoidal shear flow is given in Fig. 17 and Fig. 18. We found that $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ scales linearly with $`W`$ (see Fig. 17),

$$U_{\mathrm{cr}}=\alpha \frac{W}{\tau },$$
(22)
as predicted in CKR , with the coefficient $`\alpha `$ strongly dependent on the wavelength of the advection velocity (Fig. 18). Shear flow is most effective at quenching in the intermediate range of wavelengths, namely when $`L`$ is of the order of a few reaction lengths $`\delta `$. The quenching mechanism for small and for large $`L`$ is different; one has to distinguish between the ability of the flow to stretch the front over the larger scales and to make the initial hot band uniformly thin.

For small $`L`$, the rapid spatial variation of the flow velocity is well approximated by effective diffusion. The effective diffusivity for strong shear flow scales as $`\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}U^2l^2/\kappa `$, where $`l=\mathrm{min}(\delta ,L)`$. The characteristic length scale for reaction with this renormalized diffusion behaves as $`l_{\mathrm{eff}}\sqrt{\kappa _{\mathrm{eff}}\tau }`$ and scales linearly with $`U`$. Then $`l_{\mathrm{eff}}W`$ gives $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}\frac{\delta }{L}W\tau ^1`$ for small $`L`$. We remark that in the limit of small $`L,`$ the effective diffusivity argument can be justified by a rigorous homogenization procedure HPS .

For large $`L`$, the nature of quenching is related to the appearance of the (almost) constant regions in the velocity profile. We observe the behavior $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}L^2`$ for large $`L,`$ which can be explained in the following way. In order for quenching to occur, the shear flow should stretch the initial hot region thinner than Kanel’s critical length (of the order $`\delta `$) in time less than the reaction time $`\tau `$, so that reaction does not have time to compensate cooling by advection. The stretching is least efficient near the tip of the velocity profile. At the tip of a sinusoidal profile, the difference between flow velocities at two points separated by a distance $`\delta `$ is $`U(\delta /L)^2`$. Therefore we obtain a sufficient condition for quenching $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}\left(\frac{\delta }{L}\right)^2\tau W`$, which leads to

$$U_{\mathrm{cr}}\tau ^1W\left(\frac{L}{\delta }\right)^2.$$

We also examined a degenerate case of shear flows with a plateau in the velocity profile. For such flows it has been shown in CKR  that quenching does not happen as soon as the size of plateau is larger than certain critical size of the order $`\delta `$ and the size of initial bandwidth $`W`$ exceeds $`W_{}.`$ As expected, we found that $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ diverged to infinity as the size of the plateau approached a critical value (Fig. 19), in agreement with results of CKR . This phenomenon can be understood in terms of reaction and diffusion alone: in the region where the profile of the velocity is flat, there is no stretching of the initial hot band. If the size of the hot band is roughly larger than Kanel’s critical size $`W_{}`$, then reaction can compete with diffusion, there will be no quenching, and eventually propagating fronts will form.

Quenching in cellular flow requires significantly higher advection amplitudes. For relatively small cell sizes $`L\delta `$ where quenching is possible, we find that the critical velocity $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ satisfies $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}W^4`$ (see Figure 20). Notice that this correlates with the dependence $`vU^{1/4}`$ for the speed of advection-enhanced flame. This correlation is not coincidental, and can be explained as follows. The speed up law indicates that the size of the region where reaction happens in a stabilized combustion regime scales as $`(U/v_0)^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{1/4}\delta `$ for large $`U.`$ If the width of the initial band of hot material is of the order smaller than $`(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{1/4}\delta `$, advection carries away the energy of the hot material over the larger region faster than reaction is able to compensate the falling temperature. This leads to quenching.

We remark that quenching is impossible if the cell size is sufficiently large, $`L\delta `$, and $`W\delta `$. The reason is similar to the flat plateau effect in the shear flow. Fluid advection does not provide mixing inside cells in the direction perpendicular to the streamlines, and thus if the cell is large enough reaction can sustain itself against diffusion. This result has been proved in CKR2 .

## VI Conclusions

We carried DNS calculations of an advected scalar which reacts according to a nonlinear reaction law. We studied combustion enhancement and quenching phenomena in two typical classes of flows, shear and cellular. In a shear flow, we find linear dependence $`v=aU+b`$ of the combustion speed $`v`$ on the amplitude of the flow $`U`$ in the strong flow regime. The factor $`a`$ depends on the relationship between the period of the flow $`L`$ and typical reaction length scale $`\delta ,`$ is equal to $`1`$ if $`L\delta `$ and tends to zero if $`L/\delta 0.`$ The observed behavior is in agreement with recent rigorous CKOR  and numerical ACVV1  results. In a cellular flow we studied primarily two regimes characterized by the relationships $`\tau _D<\tau _U<\tau _R`$ and $`\tau _D<\tau _R<\tau _U`$ between diffusion, reaction and advection time scales. We found that combustion speed in the first regime is close to predictions of models based on geometrical optics limit, $`vU/\mathrm{log}(U/v_{}).`$ In the second regime where large $`U`$ dominates, we found $`vv_{}(U/v_{})^{1/4}(L/\delta )^{3/4}.`$ This agrees with the prediction of the effective diffusion model ABP ; ACVV1 ; ACVV2  in terms of the power of $`U`$ but has different dependence the cell size $`L.`$ We proposed an explanation of the observed behavior with a modified effective diffusion model where enhanced diffusivity is concentrated in the boundary layers.

As opposed to combustion enhancement, quenching may happen if the reaction term is of ignition type and initial temperature is higher than critical in a finite region. If the shear flow velocity profile does not have a plateau of sufficiently large size, or the size of the cells in cellular flow is not too large, then for any initial hot band size $`W`$ there exists $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}(W)`$ such that for $`U>U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ quenching takes place. If $`U<U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$, two fronts form and propagate with the speed of the developed advection-enhanced front. In the case of shear flow, $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ depends linearly on $`W`$ with a factor $`\alpha (L)/\tau `$. Quenching is most efficient for the flows with $`L`$ on the order of a few typical reaction lengths $`\delta `$. For the cellular flows, $`U_{\mathrm{cr}}`$ scales as $`W^4`$. The results are in good agreement with theoretical arguments.

## VII Acknowledgements

This research is supported in part by the ASCI Flash center at the University of Chicago under DOE contract B341495. PC was supported partially by NSF DMS-0202531. AK has been supported by NSF grants DMS-0102554 and DMS-0129470 and Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship. LR was supported partially by NSF grant DMS-0203537 and by an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship.