text: Fluid dynamics predicts the onset of instability and transition to turbulent flow within fluids of different densities moving at different speeds. If surface tension is ignored, two fluids in parallel motion with different velocities and densities yield an interface that is unstable to short-wavelength perturbations for all speeds. However, surface tension is able to stabilize the short wavelength instability up to a threshold velocity.
  If the density and velocity vary continuously in space (with the lighter layers uppermost, so that the fluid is RT-stable), the dynamics of the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability is described by the Taylor–Goldstein equation: 
   where  denotes the Brunt–Väisälä frequency, U is the horizontal parallel velocity, k is the wave number, c is the eigenvalue parameter of the problem,  is complex amplitude of the stream function. Its onset is given by the Richardson number . Typically the layer is unstable for . These effects are common in cloud layers. The study of this instability is applicable in plasma physics, for example in inertial confinement fusion and the plasma–beryllium interface. In situations where there is a state of static stability, evident by heavier fluids found below than the lower fluid, the Rayleigh-Taylor instability can be ignored as the Kelvin–Helmholtz instability is sufficient given the conditions.
  Numerically, the Kelvin–Helmholtz instability is simulated in a temporal or a spatial approach. In the temporal approach, the flow is considered in a periodic (cyclic) box "moving" at mean speed (absolute instability). In the spatial approach, simulations mimic a lab experiment with natural inlet and outlet conditions (convective instability).