Thermocapillary Convection in an Inhomogeneous Porous Layer

A new model consisting of an inhomogeneous porous medium saturated by incompressible fluid is investigated. We focus on the effects of inhomogeneity for the streamline patterns and instabilities of the system. Influences of the `mean porosity' and gradient of distributions of porosity are also emphasized. The results cannot be obtained by studying the media with constant porosity as carried out by other researchers, and have not been discussed before.