Turing Patterns in the BZ-AOT Reaction Experiments

All the initial reagents of the BZ reaction are hydrophilic and migrate into the water core of the droplets. Diffusion within single droplets plays no role in the pattern-forming mechanism of the BZ-AOT system, because of the small size of the droplets. Highly polar species are essentially confined to the water core of the droplets. Their diffusion coefficient is determined by the diffusion coefficient of the water droplets D, if the volume fraction of the droplets is l ss than the percolation threshold 0p (around 0.5) of the microemulsion. The value of depends on the 

Less polar or nonpolar intermediates of the BZ reaction, such as Br2 or Br02, are octane-soluble and diffuse in the oil phase as single molecules with diffusion coefficients on the order of 10 cm /s [449], Consequently, the radical Br02, which serves as a second activator, and Br2, which serves as a second inhibitor, diffuse much faster than the water-soluble BZ reactants. For low values of the volume fraction cj), the inhibitor Br2 is the dominant species in the oil phase. Since it diffuses ten to hundred times faster than the activator HBr02, confined to the slow-diffusing droplets, conditions should be favorable for the observation of Turing patterns. 

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