The dual role of shear in large-scale dynamos

dc.creatorBrandenburg, Axel
dc.date2008-08-07
dc.date.accessioned2026-07-07T09:55:20Z
dc.date.available2026-07-07T09:55:20Z
dc.descriptionThe role of shear in alleviating catastrophic quenching by shedding small-scale magnetic helicity through fluxes along contours of constant shear is discussed. The level of quenching of the dynamo effect depends on the quenched value of the turbulent magnetic diffusivity. Earlier estimates that might have suffered from the force-free degeneracy of Beltrami fields are now confirmed for shear flows where this degeneracy is lifted. For a dynamo that is saturated near equipartition field strength those estimates result in a 5-fold decrease of the magnetic diffusivity as the magnetic Reynolds number based on the wavenumber of the energy-carrying eddies is increased from 2 to 600. Finally, the role of shear in driving turbulence and large-scale fields by the magneto-rotational instability is emphasized. New simulations are presented and the 3pi/4 phase shift between poloidal and toroidal fields is confirmed. It is suggested that this phase shift might be a useful diagnostic tool in identifying mean-field dynamo action in simulations and to distinguish this from other scenarios invoking magnetic buoyancy as a means to explain migration away from the midplane.
dc.description7 pages, 10 figures, proceedings of the workshop on MHD Laboratory Experiments for Geophysics and Astrophysics
dc.identifierhttps://arxiv.org/abs/0808.0959
dc.identifierhttp://arxiv.org/abs/0808.0959
dc.identifierAstron. Nachr. 329, 725-731 (2008)
dc.identifierdoi:10.1002/asna.200811027
dc.identifier.urihttp://salesiana.dossiersoluciones.com/handle/123456789/166592
dc.subjectAstrophysics
dc.titleThe dual role of shear in large-scale dynamos
dc.typetext

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