Plasma Physics Seminar

Dr. Tomoya Tatsuno Institute for Research in Electronics and Applied Physics University of Maryland Destabilizing effect of shear flow without inflection point in ideal MHD plasma Abstract:  Shear flows are now thought to be important in many situations like various fusion devices, solar and space physics.  In this talk, the destabilizing effect of shear flows which do not contain inflection point is discussed in the scope of ideal MHD model.  The shear flow with inflection point is clearly destabilizing, since it is itself unstable even without magnetic field (it is called Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in classical fluid mechanics).  However, the flow without inflection point can destabilize certain kind of equilibria.  Since this instability is not well-known, I will try to explain the connection (or difference) with Magneto-Rotational Instability and solar tachocline physics.