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Basic MHD
(isotropic pressure)
Relevant Maxwell’s
equations; displacement
( )
current neglected
1
Convection and diffusion
Take curl of the MHD Ohm’s law and apply Faraday’s law
If the resistivity is finite, the magnetic field diffuses into the plasma to remove
local magnetic inhomogeneities, e.g., curves in the field, etc.
Let LB the characteristic scale of magnetic inhomogeneities. The solution is
where the characteristic diffusion time is
convection equation
In fully ionized plasmas Rm is often very large. E.g. in the solar wind viscosity
at 1 AU it is 1016 – 1017. This means that during the 150 million km
travel from the Sun the field diffuses about 1 km! Very ideal MHD:
2
Frozen-in field lines
A concept introduced by Hannes Alfvén but later
denounced by himself, because in the Maxwellian
sense the field lines do not have physical identity.
3
The most important assumption was the ideal MHD Ohm’s law. This requires
that the ExB drift is faster than the magnetic drifts. As the magnetic drifts lead
to the separation of electron and ion motions, i.e., electric currents, the first
correction to Ohm’s law in collisionless plasma is the Hall term
Magnetohydrostatic equilibrium
Assume scalar pressure and time-independent equilibrium
i.e., B and J are vector fields on
constant pressure surfaces
Diamagnetic current : this is the way how B
Solve for J: reacts on the presence of plasma in order
to reach magnetohydrostatic equilibrium.
This macroscopic current is a sum of drift currents and of the magnetization
current due to inhomogeneous distribution of elementary magnetic moments
(particles on Larmor motion)
dense
plasma
total
current
tenuous
plasma
4
Write the magnetic force as:
magnetic
magnetic stress tensor
pressure
Magnetohydrostatic equilibrium
after elimination of the current
Assume plasma isotropic
and nearly homogeneous:
The magnetization is
Magnetohydrostatic
equilibrium in anisotropic
plasma is described by
In case of the pressure gradient force-free field or
is negligible and the equilibrium is field-aligned current