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Chaos and Spatiotemporal Chaos in Convective Systems

Yoshiki Hidaka¹* and Noriko Oikawa²

¹Department of Applied Quantum Physics and Nuclear Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Kyushu University, Fukuoka 819-0395, Japan
²Department of Physics, Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Tokyo Metropolitan University, Tokyo 192-0397, Japan
*E-mail address: hidaka@ap.kyushu-u.ac.jp

(Received May 4, 2014; Accepted July 11, 2014)

Abstract. Much of early research on chaos from the viewpoint of physics was performed using spatially confined convective systems. In spatially extended convective systems, on the other hand, spatiotemporal chaos occurs. However, there is no unified definition for the term spatiotemporal chaos as for chaos. To unify definition, a property common to the three kinds of spatiotemporal chaos observed in electroconvection of nematic liquid crystals is presented.

Keywords: Chaos, Spatiotemporal Chaos, Convection, Correlation Length