Stability of insulating viscous jets under axial electric fields

Abstract

The stability spectrum for a jet of perfectly insulating, viscous liquid subjected to a longitudinal electric field is obtained for axisymmetric perturbations. Both dielectric forces at the interface and viscous dissipation produce lower growth factors for all the range of unstable wavelengths. If the imposed field is time varying, parametric resonances are possible but they are easily suppressed, even by a small viscosity, and the r.m.s. value of the dielectric pressure dominates over the pulsating part.