Rayleigh-Bénard convection with thermal boundary inhomogeneities

Rayleigh-Bénard convection with nonhomogeneous thermal boundaries (sinusoidal temperature patterns set in-phase at the top and bottom plates) is numerically studied in three- and two-dimensional domains. Two spatial convective scales occur: the one due to the self-organized clustering of plumes—which is known to appear in homogeneous conditions—and the scale induced by the boundary heterogeneities. The latter drives the convection patterning, both in 3D and 2D, when the wavelength of the perturbation is comparable with the self-organized one.