Effect of Marangoni number on thermocapillary convection and free-surface deformation in liquid bridges

Floating zone technique is a crucible-free process for growth of high quality single crystals. Unstable thermocapillary convection is a typical phenomenon during the process under microgravity. Therefore, it is very important to investigate the instability of thermocapillary convection in liquid bridges with deformable free-surface under microgravity. In this works, the Volume of Fluid (VOF) method is employed to track the free-surface movement. The results are presented as the behavior of flow structure and temperature distribution of the molten zone. The impact of Marangoni number ( Ma ) is also investigated on free-surface deformation as well as the instability of thermocapillary convection. The free-surface exhibits a noticeable axisymmetric (but it is non-centrosymmetric) and elliptical shape along the circumferential direction. This specific surface shape presents a typical narrow ‘neck-shaped’ structure with convex at two ends of the zone and concave at the mid-plane along the axial direction. At both θ = 0° and θ = 90°, the deformation ratio ξ increases rapidly with Ma at first, and then increases slowly. Moreover, the hydrothermal wave number m and the instability of thermocapillary convection increase with Ma .