Alfven and magnetoacoustic vortices in a plasma
Abstract
It is shown analytically that in a plasma, magnetoacoustic and Alfven waves may exist in the form of two- and three-dimensional vortices, and that dispersion spreading of the vortices is contained by nonlinear effects. The nonlinear Alfven waves form an axisymmetric waveguide along the magnetic field, the plasma in the waveguide performing vortical fluctuations in the azimuthal direction. It is noted that MHD vortices of this type have been observed in the earth's magnetosphere.
- Publication:
-
Zhurnal Eksperimentalnoi i Teoreticheskoi Fiziki
- Pub Date:
- August 1977
- Bibcode:
- 1977ZhETF..73..498P
- Keywords:
-
- Magnetoacoustic Waves;
- Magnetohydrodynamic Waves;
- Plasma Waves;
- Vortices;
- Magnetospheric Instability;
- Nonlinear Equations;
- Wave Dispersion;
- Waveguides;
- Plasma Physics