Large-scale magnetic fields at high Reynolds numbers in magnetohydrodynamic simulations

H. Hotta, M. Rempel, T. Yokoyama

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

98 Scopus citations

Abstract

The 11-year solarmagnetic cycle shows a high degree of coherence in spite of the turbulent nature of the solar convection zone. It has been found in recent high-resolutionmagnetohydrodynamics simulations that the maintenance of a large-scale coherent magnetic field is difficult with small viscosity and magnetic diffusivity (≲1012 square centimenters per second).We reproduced previous findings that indicate a reduction of the energy in the large-scalemagnetic field for lower diffusivities and demonstrate the recovery of the global-scalemagnetic field using unprecedentedly high resolution. We found an efficient small-scale dynamo that suppresses small-scale flows, which mimics the properties of large diffusivity. As a result, the global-scale magnetic field is maintained even in the regime of small diffusivities - that is, large Reynolds numbers.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1427-1430
Number of pages4
JournalScience
Volume351
Issue number6280
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 25 2016

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