Electroconvection in a Viscoelastic Electrolyte

Direct numerical simulations of a liquid electrolyte with polymer additives demonstrate that viscoelasticity promotes an earlier transition from steady to unsteady electroconvective flow. Viscoelasticity also decreases the overlimiting current resulting from convection by up to 40%. Both of these effects would reduce the time-averaged spatial variability of ion flux suggesting that polymeric fluids may inhibit dendrite growth. Polymer relaxation near a surface destabilizes the flow structures and decreases the time duration of high current fluxes. This mechanism of polymer-induced flux reduction is general to wall bounded flows with transfer of mass, heat or momentum.