Compressible Sub-Alfvenic MHD turbulence in Low-beta Plasmas
Astrophysics
2016-08-30 v1 Fluid Dynamics
Geophysics
Plasma Physics
Space Physics
Abstract
We present a model for compressible sub-Alfvenic isothermal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence in low-beta plasmas and numerically test it. We separate MHD fluctuations into 3 distinct families - Alfven, slow, and fast modes. We find that, production of slow and fast modes by Alfvenic turbulence is suppressed. As a result, Alfven modes in compressible regime exhibit scalings and anisotropy similar to those in incompressible regime. Slow modes passively mimic Alfven modes. However, fast modes show isotropy and a scaling similar to acoustic turbulence.
Cite
@article{arxiv.astro-ph/0205282,
title = {Compressible Sub-Alfvenic MHD turbulence in Low-beta Plasmas},
author = {Jungyeon Cho and A. Lazarian},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:astro-ph/0205282},
year = {2016}
}
Comments
4 pages, 8 figures, Phys. Rev. Lett., in press