Riemann problem aplied to far from thermodynamical equilibrium processes during heat transport
Abstract Book of the XXIII IUPAP International Conference on Statistical Physics, Genova, Italy, (9-13 July 2007)Abstract
In this work we analyze the case of a heat pulse propagating inside a plasma. This problem has been studied by means of non-equilibrium irreversible thermodynamics leading to a non-linear relaxation constitutive equation of the heat transport known as Maxwell-Cattaneo-Vernotte equation. This constitutive equation jointly with the energy equation produces hyperbolic equations as a function of temperature which are of conservative type. Our goal is to solve these equations using the Riemann problem (IV Cauchy problem) finding the characteristic curves associated to the heat waves propagation and therefore to determine in which conditions heat shock waves appears.