Descripción: Fil:Gratton, F.T. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina.

Descripción: Fil:Contin, J.E. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales; Argentina.

Descripción: The compressible magnetohydrodynamic Kelvin-Helmholtz instability occurs in two varieties, one that can be called incompressible as it exists in the limit of vanishing compressibility (primary instability), while the other exists only when compressibility is included in the model (secondary instability). In previous work we developed techniques to investigate the stability of a surface of discontinuity between two different uniform flows. Our treatment includes arbitrary jumps of the velocity and magnetic fields as well as of density and temperature, with no restriction on the wave vector of the modes. Then it allows stability analyses of complex configurations not previously studied in detail. Here we apply our methods to investigate the stability of various typical situations occurring at different regions of the front side, and the near flanks of the magnetopause. The physical conditions of the vector and scalar fields that characterize the equilibrium interface at the positions considered are obtained both from experimental data and from results of simulation codes of the magnetosheath available in the literature. We give particular attention to the compressible modes in configurations in which the incompressible modes are stabilized by the magnetic shear. For configurations of the front of the magnetopause, which have small relative velocities, we find that the incompressible MHD model gives reliable estimates of their stability, and compressibility effects do not introduce significant changes. However, at the flanks of the magnetopause the occurrence of the secondary instability and the shift of the boundary of the primary instability play an important role. Consequently, configurations that are stable if compressibility is neglected turn out to be unstable when it is considered and the stability properties are quite sensitive on the values of the parameters. Then compressibility should be taken into account when assessing the stability properties of these configurations, since the estimates based on incompressible MHD may be misleading. A careful analysis is required in each case, since no simple rule of thumb can be given.

Descripción: A Three-Dimensional Finite Volume Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian simulation code was developed to study different plasma physics problems in 3D+t. The code is based on a complex multi-component species program with transport and radiation terms written and applied to plasma and fusion physics problems. Three different examples are shown: double-base chemical propellant combustion, ignition and propagation of a thermonuclear detonation wave, and, the development of the Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability in local plane slab models of the magnetopause, showing the response of a background equilibrium to the excitation by finite amplitude perturbations generated upstream. © 2006 American Institute of Physics.

Descripción: Working within the domain of inviscid incompressible MHD theory, we found that a tangential discontinuity (TD) separating two uniform regions of different density, velocity and magnetic field may be Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) stable and yet a study of a transition between the same constant regions given by a continuous velocity profile shows the presence of the instability with significant growth rates. Since the cause of the instability stems from the velocity gradient, and since a TD may be considered as the ultimate limit of such gradient, the statement comes as a surprise. In fact, a long wavelength (λ) boundary for the KH instability does not exist in ordinary liquids being instead a consequence of the presence of magnetic shear, a possibility that has passed unnoticed in the literature. It is shown that KH modes of a magnetic field configuration with constant direction do not have the long A boundary. A theoretical explanation of this feature and examples of the violation of the TD stability condition are given using a model that can be solved in closed form. Stability diagrams in the (kd, MA) plane are given (where kd = 2πd/λ, 2d is the velocity gradient length scale, and MA is the Alfvénic Mach number) that show both the well-known limit at small λs and the boundary for large but finite As noted here. Consequences of this issue are relevant for stability studies of the dayside magnetopause as the stability condition for a TD should be used with care in data analysis work.