The Study of the Richtmyer–Meshkov Instability on the Passage of Incident and Reflected Shock Waves through a Gaseous Interface∗

Abstract. We have made an experimental investigation of the evolution of the Richtmyer-Meshkov Instability (RMI) on the passage of the incident and reflected shock waves through an interface. The experiments have been performed in a shock tube for continuous and discontinuous interfaces. The discontinuous interface was modeled by a thin film. The continuous interface was obtained in a test section with a fast removable plate. We used different combinations of rare gases. One experiment with discontinuous interface has been simulated with a 2D Eulerian code and the agreement is good. We evaluate the dependence of the growth rate of the RMI after reflected shock on the one after incident shock.