Abstract
The steady laminar flow of two immiscible, uniformly rotating fluid layers is studied and exact similarity solutions of the axisymmetric Navier-Stokes equations in cylindrical polar coordinates are found. The similarity solutions occur with a flat interface at z = 0 under the parameter restriction that σ²ρ = 1 where σ is the ratio of the fluid angular velocities at z = ±∞ and ρ is the density ratio of the two fluids. Under this restriction the problem reduces to one with two independent parameters, σ and μ, which is the viscosity ratio of the fluids. Numerical results of the resulting system of ODEs are found for selected values of μ and σ, and it is shown that similarity solutions exist for σc(μ)≤ σ ≤ 1 where σc(μ) ˂ 0 (i.e. counter-rotating flows). For σ ˂ 0 the lower fluid can become divided into two distinct recirculation regions between which fluid cannot transfer.