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At least 145 records · Page 8

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DOE OSTI2024

Proton Cyclotron Waves and Pickup Ion Ring Distribution Instabilities Upstream of Mars

Proton cyclotron waves (PCWs) upstream of Mars are thought to be associated with the instabilities of pickup ions. The instabilities of pickup ions of ring distributions have larger maximum growth rates compared with beam distributions. However, observations revealed a notably‐reduced occurrence rate of PCWs for pickup ions of ring distributions. Linear instability analysis and a corresponding two‐dimensional particle‐in‐cell (PIC) simulation are performed to investigate the instabilities of pickup ion ring distributions upstream of Mars. Linear instability analysis indicates that a pickup ion ring distribution is unstable to the ion cyclotron, ion Bernstein, and mirror instabilities. The corresponding PIC simulation confirms the linear analysis results and further demonstrates that the pickup ions are scattered toward an isotropic shell distribution by the waves excited. Interestingly, the saturation energy of the waves is much lower than that driven by a corresponding pickup ion beam distribution, and mirror waves eventually dominate the system.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2026

Capturing Secondary Kinetic Instabilities in Three‐Dimensional Dayside Reconnection Using an Improved Gradient‐Based Closure

Magnetic reconnection is a highly dynamic process that excites a wide variety of kinetic waves and instabilities. Transverse current sheet instabilities such as the lower-hybrid drift and secondary drift-kink instabilities in particular have been shown by kinetic simulations to modify the reconnection and introduce significant turbulence and mixing to the reconnection layer. Past studies using the ten-moment fluid model to capture important kinetic physics such as the electron inertia and full representation of the pressure tensor proved advantageous to a two-fluid representation of reconnection, but the model struggled when using a local relaxation closure for the heat flux to replicate the current sheet instabilities and subsequent mixing seen in kinetic simulations. This work uses the Gkeyll software framework to perform simulations of asymmetric reconnection based on the 16 October 2015 MMS crossing of a diffusion region, the Burch event. An improved gradient-based heat flux closure is implemented, showing significant improvement in secondary kinetic instabilities that grow in the current sheet. These instabilities generate turbulence which leads to growth of secondary magnetic islands and flux ropes.

Bradshaw, K. [Princeton University, NJ (United Sta↗

DOE OSTI2022

Identification of a non-axisymmetric mode in laboratory experiments searching for standard magnetorotational instability

Abstract The standard magnetorotational instability (SMRI) is a promising mechanism for turbulence and rapid accretion in astrophysical disks. It is a magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) instability that destabilizes otherwise hydrodynamically stable disk flow. Due to its microscopic nature at astronomical distances and stringent requirements in laboratory experiments, SMRI has remained unconfirmed since its proposal, despite its astrophysical importance. Here we report a nonaxisymmetric MHD instability in a modified Taylor-Couette experiment. To search for SMRI, a uniform magnetic field is imposed along the rotation axis of a swirling liquid-metal flow. The instability initially grows exponentially, becoming prominent only for sufficient flow shear and moderate magnetic field. These conditions for instability are qualitatively consistent with SMRI, but at magnetic Reynolds numbers below the predictions of linear analyses with periodic axial boundaries. Three-dimensional numerical simulations, however, reproduce the observed instability, indicating that it grows linearly from the primary axisymmetric flow modified by the applied magnetic field.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2020

Further developments on observations of the Taylor instability in a dusty plasma

We previously reported the observation of a hydrodynamic-type interchange instability occurring sporadically at the curved interface between two dust clouds of different densities, in a three-dimensional dusty plasma [Pacha et al., Phys. Plasmas 19, 014501 (2012)]. The mechanism for the instability was not conclusively identified. Further analysis of the video images has been performed, showing that the instability is associated with the appearance of large amplitude dust acoustic waves or shocks. Evidence of a dust acoustic shock at the boundary, which could drive a Richtmyer–Meshkov-type instability, will be presented. We also discuss the possibility, suggested by Avinash and Sen [Phys. Plasmas 22, 083707 (2015)], that the observed instability is due to a Rayleigh–Taylor instability driven by a component of the gravitational acceleration, which is perpendicular to the curved boundary.

Pacha, K. A.↗

DOE OSTI2021

High-fidelity kinetic modeling of instabilities and gyromotion physics in nonuniform low-beta plasmas

A fourth-order accurate continuum kinetic Vlasov solver and a systematic method for constructing customizable kinetic equilibria are demonstrated to be powerful tools for the study of nonuniform collisionless low-beta plasmas. The noise-free methodology is applied to investigate two gradient-driven instabilities in 4D (x,y,vx,vy) phase space: the Kelvin–Helmholtz instability and the lower hybrid drift instability. Nonuniform two-species configurations where ion gyroradii are comparable to gradient scale lengths are explored. The approach sheds light on the evolution of the pressure tensor in Kelvin–Helmholtz instabilities and demonstrates that the associated stress tensor deviates significantly from the gyroviscous stress tensor. Even at high magnetization, first-order approximations to finite-gyromotion physics are shown to be inadequate for the Kelvin–Helmholtz instability, as shear scales evolve to become on par with gyromotion scales. The methodology facilitates exploring transport and energy partitioning properties associated with lower hybrid drift instabilities in low-beta plasma configurations. Distribution function features are captured in detail, including the formation of local extrema in the vicinity of particle-wave resonances. Finally, the approach enables detailed targeted investigations and advances kinetic simulation capability for plasmas in which gyromotion plays an important role.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

DOE OSTI2023

Mitigation of resistive drift wave and ion temperature gradient instabilities by velocity shear

The effects of velocity shear on the resistive drift wave instability in the non-adiabatic limit and the toroidal ion temperature gradient instability are investigated for a plasma of inhomogeneous density/ion temperature, respectively. For the resistive drift wave, we find that the instability growth rate decreases monotonically with increasing magnitude of shear, but we find that complete stabilization is impossible. For the ion temperature gradient instability, we find that the standard WKB approximation is insufficient to describe the full behavior of the instability, and that an analysis of the localized eigenmode problem reveals two separate unstable solutions, which the WKB approximation does not predict. The impact of flow shear on these two new unstable solutions is discussed. In both resistive drift wave and ion temperature gradient instabilities, the sheared flow causes a shifting, tilting, and sharpening of the electrostatic potential eddies.

Physics↗

DOE OSTI2022

Study of the electrothermal and MHD instabilities in exploding cylindrical foil liner

Abstract An experimental and numerical study of the plasma instabilities in an electrical exploding cylindrical Al liner is reported. The Al liner 3 mm in diameter and 10 μ m in thickness is exploded at the Qin-1 facility (450 ns, 400 kA). Various diagnostics, such as multi-frame laser shadowgraphy, an x-ray framing camera, and an x-ray backlighting system are developed. The different imaging systems are sensitive to plasma of different areal densities based on the comparison between the experiments and simulation, which reveal the dynamics of the exploding liner in more detail. The laser shadow images show the low-density plasma (∼1–2 × 10 −4 g cm −2 ) at the edge of the liner, and both the amplitude and wavelength of the plasma instabilities increase over time, which are considered to be magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) instabilities rather than electrothermal instabilities. During the ablation of the liner, quasi-periodic azimuthally correlated striations are directly observed in extreme ultraviolet (EUV) self-emission images. Meanwhile, the vertical filaments, which are electrothermal instabilities for plasma under the condition of ∂ η /∂ T < 0, are also observed in EUV self-emission images. The x-ray backlighting images of the exploding liner are obtained by placing an X -pinch load on the current-return path to serve as an x-ray point source (∼1 ns, ∼10 μ m). The x-ray backlighting results show the behavior of the high-density plasma (∼1.89 × 10 −3 g cm −2 ), which includes the transition from electrothermal to MHD instabilities. Finally, we realized a 2D MHD simulation of the exploding liner under experimental conditions, which shows good agreement with the results of the experimental perturbation.

Physics↗

DOE OSTI2024

Influence of Natural Gas Addition on Combustion Instabilities on a Lean-Premixed Hydrogen Flame

The influence of fuel composition on combustion instabilities in a high-pressure combustor operated with hydrogen and natural gas fuels is characterized. A micromix multi-stage injector with 19 elements is used to introduce hydrogen and natural gas premixed with heated air into an optically accessible combustor. As the equivalence ratio and flame temperature is varied along with change in hydrogen fraction in the fuel, self-excited longitudinal instabilities are observed in the combustor. The instability amplitude reduces considerably as hydrogen fraction is increased. This sensitivity differs at higher flame temperature, with large amplitude instabilities attenuating at lower hydrogen fractions for flames with more thermal power. Increasing hydrogen concentration is shown, through kinetic modeling, to decrease the bulk reaction timescale linearly with observed instability amplitude. Spatial distribution of heat release in the combustor evaluated from OH* chemiluminescence imaging reveals excitation of primarily the 2L mode in the combustion chamber at ~1100 Hz, at all equivalence ratios and fuel compositions. Increasing equivalence ratio and hydrogen addition decreases the length of the positively correlated region, which leads to instability dampening.

08 HYDROGEN↗

DOE OSTI2023

Light Curves and Event Rates of Axion Instability Supernovae

Abstract It was recently proposed that exotic particles can trigger a new stellar instability that is analogous to the e − e + pair instability if they are produced and reach equilibrium in the stellar plasma. In this study, we construct axion instability supernova (AISN) models caused by the new instability to predict their observational signatures. We focus on heavy axion-like particles (ALPs) with masses of ∼400 keV–2 MeV and coupling with photons of g a γ ∼ 10 −5 GeV −1 . It is found that the 56 Ni mass and the explosion energy are significantly increased by ALPs for a fixed stellar mass. As a result, the peak times of the light curves of AISNe occur earlier than those of standard pair-instability supernovae by 10–20 days when the ALP mass is equal to the electron mass. Also, the event rate of AISNe is 1.7–2.6 times higher than that of pair-instability supernovae, depending on the high mass cutoff of the initial mass function.

Mori, Kanji (ORCID:0000000325951657)↗

DOE OSTI2024

The Effect of Spatially Varying Collision Frequency on the Development of the Rayleigh–Taylor Instability

Abstract The Rayleigh–Taylor (RT) instability is ubiquitously observed, yet has traditionally been studied using ideal fluid models. Collisionality can vary strongly across the fluid interface, and previous work demonstrates the necessity of kinetic models to completely capture dynamics in certain collisional regimes. Where previous kinetic simulations used spatially and temporally constant collision frequency, this work presents five-dimensional (two spatial, three velocity dimensions) continuum-kinetic simulations of the RT instability using a more realistic spatially varying collision frequency. Three cases of collisional variation are explored for two Atwood numbers: low to intermediate, intermediate to high, and low to high. The low-to-intermediate case exhibits no RT instability growth, while the intermediate-to-high case is similar to a fluid-limit kinetic case with interface widening biased toward the lower-collisionality region. A novel contribution of this work is the low-to-high collisionality case that shows significantly altered instability growth through an upward movement of the interface and damped spike growth due to increased free-streaming particle diffusion in the lower region. Contributions to the energy flux from the non-Maxwellian portions of the distribution function are not accessible to fluid models and are greatest in magnitude in the spike and regions of low collisionality. Increasing the Atwood number results in greater RT instability growth and reduced upward interface movement. Deviation of the distribution function from Maxwellian is inversely proportional to collision frequency and concentrated around the fluid interface. The linear phase of RT instability growth is well described by theoretical linear growth rates accounting for viscosity and diffusion.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

DOE OSTI2024

Kink Instability of Flux Ropes in Partially Ionized Plasmas

In the solar atmosphere, flux ropes are subject to current-driven instabilities that are crucial in driving plasma eruptions, ejections, and heating. A typical ideal magnetohydrodynamics instability developing in flux ropes is the helical kink, which twists the flux rope axis. The growth of this instability can trigger magnetic reconnection, which can explain the formation of chromospheric jets and spicules, but its development has never been investigated in a partially ionized plasma (PIP). Here, we study the kink instability in PIP to understand how it develops in the solar chromosphere, where it is affected by charge-neutral interactions. Partial ionization speeds up the onset of the nonlinear phase of the instability, as the plasma β of the isolated plasma is smaller than the total plasma β of the bulk. The distribution of the released magnetic energy changes in fully ionized plasma and PIP, with a larger increase in internal energy associated with the PIP cases. The temperature in PIP increases faster also due to heating terms from the two-fluid dynamics. PIP effects trigger kink instability on shorter time scales, which is reflected in more explosive chromospheric flux rope dynamics. These results are crucial to understanding the dynamics of small-scale chromospheric structures—minifilament eruptions—that thus far have been largely neglected but could significantly contribute to chromospheric heating and jet formation.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

NASA NTRS1972

A study and classification of non-linear high frequency ionospheric instabilities by coupled mode theory.

Two basic high-frequency ionospheric instabilities are discussed - i.e., the three-wave parametric interaction, and the oscillating two-stream instability. In the parametric instability, the ion-acoustic wave has a complex frequency, whereas in the oscillating two-stream instability the ion-acoustic frequency is purely imaginary. The parametric instability is shown to be the only one whose threshold depends on the ion collision frequency. A coupled-mode theory is proposed which permits study and classification of high-frequency instabilities on a unified basis.

Harker, K. J.↗

NASA NTRS1973

Electromagnetic instabilities in non-uniform anisotropic plasmas

The mechanisms of electromagnetic instabilities in nonuniform plasmas are analyzed, taking into account the anisotropy in temperature and temperature gradients. It is shown that resonance-type drift instabilities can be produced in nonuniform plasmas by resonant interactions between ions or electrons and plasma drift waves when the temperature anisotropy and temperature gradients vary widely. In contrast, production of off-resonance type instabilities is found to be possible only when the temperature gradients are much greater than the magnetic field gradients. It is pointed out that these findings are applicable to solar wind plasmas with hydromagnetic instabilities and shock transition regions. Attention is given to the occurrence of resonance ion instabilities and off-resonance drift cyclotron instabilities in the solar wind.

Buti, B.↗

NASA NTRS1975

Barotropic instability in relation to the generation of synoptic-scale atmospheric vortices

At mid-latitudes, where baroclinicity predominates, barotropic instability cannot account for the development of a cyclone. Barotropic models rarely predict the formation of extratropical cyclones. However, after large-scale disturbances have developed due to baroclinic instability, further development may be aided by barotropic instability. In the present paper, an attempt is made to relate barotropic instability to the generation of synoptic-scale atmospheric vortices, using the synoptic data of the tornado outbreak over the area of the United States on April 3, 1974. A barotropic instability analysis of wind profiles shows that the atmosphere above the area hit by the tornado was barotropically most unstable during the outbreak. This indicates that barotropic instability may have been synoptically associated with the outbreak. The need to study additional cases is pointed out

Tseng, C.-Y.↗

NASA NTRS1980

The concept of wave overreflection and its application to baroclinic instability

The paper reviews the concept of wave overreflection and its application to baroclinic instability. The instabilities associated with overreflection are likely to be identical to critical layer instabilities; the baroclinic instability is examined in terms of overreflection of vertically propagating Rossby waves which leads to rapid estimates of growth rates and phase speeds of unstable modes for arbitrary distributions of zonal velocities in models with and without lids. It was found that Charney and Green modes are essentially critical-layer instabilities and that baroclinic instability can be eliminated by stretching the transition region from zero shear at the ground to the interior shear. Finally, it is shown that the potential vorticity flux of baroclinically unstable modes is confined to a layer between the ground and the neighborhood of the steering level.

Lindzen, R. S.↗

NASA NTRS1980

Instability process in low Reynolds number supersonic jets

The objective of the present research was to characterize the instability of supersonic jets of Mach numbers 1.4, 2.1, and 2.5 in the Reynolds number range around 8000. In this Reynolds number range the jet instability has its maximum coherence so that its properties as well as the acoustic properties can be most clearly identified. Growth rate, wavelength, and wave orientation of dominant spectral components of the instability for the three Mach number jets were measured in order to characterize the instability. The saturation and subsequent decay on the instability are coincident with a drastic decrease in the coherence of the instability. Associated research shows that the phenomenon of rapid growth and decay is of fundamental importance in the noise generation process.

Morrison, G. L.↗

NASA NTRS1983

Secondary instability of wall-bounded shear flows

The present analysis of a secondary instability in a wide class of wall-bounded parallel shear flows indicates that two-dimensional, finite amplitude waves are exponentially unstable to infinitessimal three-dimensional disturbances. The instability appears to be the prototype of transitional instability in such flows as Poiseuille flow, Couette flow, and flat plate boundary layers, in that it has the convective time scales observed in the typical transitions. The energetics and vorticity dynamics of the instability are discussed, and it is shown that the two-dimensional perturbation without directly providing energy to the disturbance. The three-dimensional instability requires that a threshold two-dimensional amplitude be achieved. It is found possible to identify experimental features of transitional spot structure with aspects of the nonlinear two-dimensional/linear three-dimensional instability.

Orszag, S. A.↗

NASA NTRS1984

Comparative study of the loss cone-driven instabilities in the low solar corona

A comparative study of the loss cone-driven instabilities in the low solar corona is undertaken. The instabilities considered are the electron cyclotron maser, the whistler, and the electrostatic upper hybrid. It is shown that the first-harmonic extraordinary mode of the electron cyclotron maser instability is the fastest growing mode for strong magnetized plasma (the ratio of plasma frequency to cyclotron frequency being less than 0.35). For values of the ratio between 0.35 and 1.0, the first-harmonic ordinary mode of the electron cyclotron maser instability dominates the emission. For ratio values greater than 1.0, no direct electromagnetic radiation is expected since other instabilities, which do not escape directly, saturate the electron cyclotron maser (the whistler or the electrostatic upper hybrid waves). It is also shown that the second-harmonic electron cyclotron maser emission never grows to an appreciable level. Thus, it is suggested that the electron cyclotron maser instability can be the explanation for the escape of the first harmonic from a flaring loop.

Sharma, R. R.↗