Effect of external noise on the hysteresis characteristics of a thermoacoustic system

We present the effect of noise on the hysteresis characteristics of a prototypical thermoacoustic system, a horizontal Rijke tube. As we increase the noise intensity, we find that the width of the hysteresis zone decreases. However, we find that the rate of decrease in hysteresis width is constant for all the mass flow rates considered in the present study. We also show that the subcritical transition observed in the absence of noise is no longer discernible once the intensity of noise is above a threshold value and the transition appears to be continuous. We compare our experimental observations with the results obtained from a numerical model perturbed with additive Gaussian white noise and we find a qualitative agreement between the experimental and the numerical results.