The density fluctuations in a molecular fluid are studied by treating the fluid as a multicomponent reacting mixture. The ordinary hydrodynamic equations for a reacting mixture form the starting point of the present derivation. The description is then contracted to that appropriate for the one-component molecular fluid. The resulting translational hydrodynamics theory contains memory effects due to the internal relaxation process. The results are compared with a recent kinetic model and with two previous theories of Mountain. The dynamic structure factor $S(k, \omega )$ and the roots of the dispersion relation are computed for parahydrogen gas and studied as a function of density. The results indicate that the treatment of the thermal-diffusivity mode in the theories by Mountain breaks down in the low-density region. It is suggested that Rayleigh-Brillouin scattering experiments on dilute parahydrogen gas at room temperature and densities between 5 and 30 amagats can quantitatively verify the predictions of translational hydrodynamics.

Close

PrevNext

View figure in article