On the Stability of Poiseuille Flow of a Bingham Fluid

The stability to linearized two-dimensional disturbances of plane Poiseuille flow of a Bingham fluid is considered. Bingham fluids exhibit a yield stress in addition to a plastic viscosity and this description is typically applied to drilling muds. A non-zero yield stress results in an additional parameter, a Bingham number, and it is found that the minimum Reynolds number for linear instability increases almost linearly with increasing Bingham number. © 1994, Cambridge University Press. All rights reserved.