Formation of Root Singularities on the Free Surface of a Conducting Fluid in an Electric Field

Abstract

The formation of singularities on a free surface of a conducting ideal fluid in a strong electric field is considered. It is found that the nonlinear equations of two-dimensional fluid motion can be solved in the small-angle approximation. This enables us to show that for almost arbitrary initial conditions the surface curvature becomes infinite in a finite time.Comment: latex, 6 pages, no figure