Shocks, interfaces, and patterns in supersonic jets

Abstract Supersonic gaseous jets exhibit coherent nonlinear dynamic structures. We use a supercomputer to obtain solutions to the equations of two-dimensional inviscid hydrodynamics, representing both axisymmetric and planar jets boring their way through a uniform medium. We use color images to display these high resolution computations. Several basic morphologies of interfaces and shock structures arise which we discuss in simple terms. The global structure of the two-parameter solution space is analyzed. A number of the basic structures, which appear in the supercomputer simulations, seem to occur in both terrestrial and astrophysical supersonic jets.