Temperature profile of two steps Arrhenius, Bimolecular and Sensitized exothermic chemical reactions in a slab

Abstract

In this study, we examine the unsteady state of a two step exothermic chemical reaction in a slab, taking the diffusion of the reactant into account and assuming a temperature dependent pre-exponential factor. The nonlinear partial differential equation governing the transient reaction-diffusion problem is solved numerically using a semi-discretization finite difference technique. We observed that the maximum temperature is  obtained in bimolecular type of reaction. It was established that the steady state solution was reached at t= 0.5 which allow us to see the influence of other parameters coming into the model.

Keywords: Temperature profile; Two steps exothermic reaction; Thermal stability; bimolecular; sensitized; Arrhenius; slab