A Study of Magnetic Helicity in Decaying and Forced 3D-MHD Turbulence

This thesis presents a numerical study of a property of three dimensional magnetohydrodynamic (3D-MHD) turbulence, namely, inverse cascade (spectral transport from small scales to large scales) of magnetic helicity. Magnetic helicity is defined as the volume integral of the dot product of the magnetic field and the magnetic vector potential. It characterizes the linkage and twists of the magnetic field lines. The inverse cascade is believed to be one of the causes of large-scale magnetic structure formation in the universe. This numerical studies is aimed at understanding how the inverse cascade of magnetic helicity effects other quantities of the turbulent flow. Two setups, namely, forced turbulence and decaying turbulence are studied. In the forced case, the numerical simulation setup consists of an initial energy distribution and a forcing localized in the small scales. The decaying setup consists of an initial energy distribution in the intermediate scales, which is allowed to decay naturally. The analysis of the results shows that several quantities in the turbulent flow, show self-similar behavior in their spectra, giving rise to power laws, which were hitherto unknown. Some of the quantities which are known to show power law behaviors exhibit different values to the power law exponents. These power law behaviors are analyzed together with the dimensional analysis of the eddy damped quasi normal Markovian (EDQNM) approximation equations, to attain a new relation which explains the evolution of large-scale magnetic structures in both the turbulent setups. The results are substantiated by the analysis of structure functions, probability density functions and correlation functions. Visualization of real space structures is also carried out. A mechanism to achieve large-scale magnetic structures from random small-scale magnetic fluctuations involving both the forced and decaying turbulences, is suggested.

Level thesis:degree_level

thesis.doctoral

Grantor dc:publisher

Universität Bayreuth

Year

2009

Author dc:creator

• Malapaka, Shiva Kunar

Contributors dc:contributor

• Müller-Nutzinger, Priv.-Doz. Dr. Wolf-Christian

Repository record source_url

https://epub.uni-bayreuth.de/id/eprint/488/

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:epub.uni-bayreuth.de:488