198 research outputs found
Rotational Stabilization of Magnetically Collimated Jets
We investigate the launching and stability of extragalactic jets through
nonlinear magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulation and linear eigenmode analysis.
In the simulations of jet evolution, a small-scale equilibrium magnetic arcade
is twisted by a differentially rotating accretion disk. These simulations
produce a collimated outflow which is unstable to the current driven m=1 kink
mode for low rotational velocities of the accretion disk relative to the Alfven
speed of the coronal plasma. The growth rate of the kink mode in the jet is
shown to be inversely related to the rotation rate of the disk, and the jet is
stable for high rotation rates. Linear MHD calculations investigate the effect
of rigid rotation on the kink mode in a cylindrical plasma. These calculations
show that the Coriolis force distorts the m=1 kink eigenmode and stabilizes it
at rotation frequencies such that the rotation period is longer than a few
Alfven times.Comment: 17 pages, 21 figures, final published version, updated to include a
discussion of the effect of rotation on increasing magnetic pitch equilibri
Transitions to improved confinement regimes induced by changes in heating in zero-dimensional models for tokamak plasmas
It is shown that rapid substantial changes in heating rate can induce
transitions to improved energy confinement regimes in zero-dimensional models
for tokamak plasma phenomenology. We examine for the first time the effect of
step changes in heating rate in the models of E-J.Kim and P.H.Diamond,
Phys.Rev.Lett. 90, 185006 (2003) and M.A.Malkov and P.H.Diamond, Phys.Plasmas
16, 012504 (2009) which nonlinearly couple the evolving temperature gradient,
micro-turbulence and a mesoscale flow; and in the extension of H.Zhu,
S.C.Chapman and R.O.Dendy, Phys.Plasmas 20, 042302 (2013), which couples to a
second mesoscale flow component. The temperature gradient rises, as does the
confinement time defined by analogy with the fusion context, while
micro-turbulence is suppressed. This outcome is robust against variation of
heating rise time and against introduction of an additional variable into the
model. It is also demonstrated that oscillating changes in heating rate can
drive the level of micro-turbulence through a period-doubling path to chaos,
where the amplitude of the oscillatory component of the heating rate is the
control parameter.Comment: 8 pages, 14 figure
Experimental Identification of the Kink Instability as a Poloidal Flux Amplification Mechanism for Coaxial Gun Spheromak Formation
The magnetohydrodynamic kink instability is observed and identified
experimentally as a poloidal flux amplification mechanism for coaxial gun
spheromak formation. Plasmas in this experiment fall into three distinct
regimes which depend on the peak gun current to magnetic flux ratio, with (I)
low values resulting in a straight plasma column with helical magnetic field,
(II) intermediate values leading to kinking of the column axis, and (III) high
values leading immediately to a detached plasma. Onset of column kinking agrees
quantitatively with the Kruskal-Shafranov limit, and the kink acts as a dynamo
which converts toroidal to poloidal flux. Regime II clearly leads to both
poloidal flux amplification and the development of a spheromak configuration.Comment: accepted for publication in Physical Review Letter
A comparison of incompressible limits for resistive plasmas
The constraint of incompressibility is often used to simplify the
magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) description of linearized plasma dynamics because it
does not affect the ideal MHD marginal stability point. In this paper two
methods for introducing incompressibility are compared in a cylindrical plasma
model: In the first method, the limit is taken, where
is the ratio of specific heats; in the second, an anisotropic mass
tensor is used, with the component parallel to the magnetic
field taken to vanish, . Use of resistive MHD reveals
the nature of these two limits because the Alfv\'en and slow magnetosonic
continua of ideal MHD are converted to point spectra and moved into the complex
plane. Both limits profoundly change the slow-magnetosonic spectrum, but only
the second limit faithfully reproduces the resistive Alfv\'en spectrum and its
wavemodes. In ideal MHD, the slow magnetosonic continuum degenerates to the
Alfv\'en continuum in the first method, while it is moved to infinity by the
second. The degeneracy in the first is broken by finite resistivity. For
numerical and semi-analytical study of these models, we choose plasma
equilibria which cast light on puzzling aspects of results found in earlier
literature.Comment: 14 pages, 10 figure
From 'River Cottage' to 'Chicken Run': Hugh Fearnley-Whttingstall and the class politics of ethical consumption
Lifestyle television provides a key site through which to explore the dilemmas of ethical consumption, as the genre shifts to consider the ethics of different consumption practices and taste cultures. UK television cook Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's TV programmes offer fertile ground not only for thinking about television personalities as lifestyle experts and moral entrepreneurs, but also for thinking about how the meanings and uses of their television image are inflected by genre. In this article we explore how the shift from the lifestyled downshifting narrative of the River Cottage series to the 'campaigning culinary documentary' Hugh's Chicken Run exposes issues of celebrity, class and ethics. While both series are concerned with ethical consumption, they work in different ways to reveal a distinction between 'ethical' and 'unethical' consumption practices and positions - positions that are inevitably classed
The effect of collisions on wave-breaking in a cold plasma
The effect of electron collisions on reducing the wave-breaking amplitude of resonantly-driven electrostatic fields in a cold plasma is investigated. By means of a simple theory collisions are shown to compete with wave-breaking in dissipating wave energy.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/47032/1/339_2004_Article_BF00899888.pd
The Grad-Shafranov Reconstruction of Toroidal Magnetic Flux Ropes: Method Development and Benchmark Studies
We develop an approach of Grad-Shafranov (GS) reconstruction for toroidal
structures in space plasmas, based on in-situ spacecraft measurements. The
underlying theory is the GS equation that describes two-dimensional
magnetohydrostatic equilibrium as widely applied in fusion plasmas. The
geometry is such that the arbitrary cross section of the torus has rotational
symmetry about the rotation axis , with a major radius . The magnetic
field configuration is thus determined by a scalar flux function and a
functional that is a single-variable function of . The algorithm is
implemented through a two-step approach: i) a trial-and-error process by
minimizing the residue of the functional to determine an optimal
axis orientation, and ii) for the chosen , a minimization process
resulting in the range of . Benchmark studies of known analytic solutions
to the toroidal GS equation with noise additions are presented to illustrate
the two-step procedures and to demonstrate the performance of the numerical GS
solver, separately. For the cases presented, the errors in and are
9 and 22\%, respectively, and the relative percent error in the
numerical GS solutions is less than 10\%. We also make public the computer
codes for these implementations and benchmark studies.Comment: submitted to Sol. Phys. late Dec 2016; under review; code will be
made public once review is ove
Pressure-driven instabilities in astrophysical jets
Astrophysical jets are widely believed to be self-collimated by the
hoop-stress due to the azimuthal component of their magnetic field. However
this implies that the magnetic field is largely dominated by its azimuthal
component in the outer jet region. In the fusion context, it is well-known that
such configurations are highly unstable in static columns, leading to plasma
disruption. It has long been pointed out that a similar outcome may follow for
MHD jets, and the reasons preventing disruption are still not elucidated,
although some progress has been accomplished in the recent years.
In these notes, I review the present status of this open problem for
pressure-driven instabilities, one of the two major sources of ideal MHD
instability in static columns (the other one being current-driven
instabilities).
I first discuss in a heuristic way the origin of these instabilities.
Magnetic resonances and magnetic shear are introduced, and their role in
pressure-driven instabilities discussed in relation to Suydam's criterion. A
dispersion relation is derived for pressure-driven modes in the limit of large
azimuthal magnetic fields, which gives back the two criteria derived by
Kadomtsev for this instability. The growth rates of these instabilities are
expected to be short in comparison with the jet propagation time.
What is known about the potential stabilizing role of the axial velocity of
jets is then reviewed. In particular, a nonlinear stabilization mechanism
recently identified in the fusion literature is discussed.
Key words: Ideal MHD: stability, pressure-driven modes; Jets: stabilityComment: 20 pages, 3 figures. Lecture given at the JETSET European school
"Numerical MHD and Instabilities". To be published by Springer in the
"Lectures notes in physics" serie
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