Numerical Experiments Base on the Catastrophe Model of Solar Eruptionstwo

On the basis of the catastrophe model developed by Isenberg et al., we have used the NIRVANA code to perform the magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) numerical experiments to look into the various behaviors of the coronal magnetic configuration that includes a current-carrying flux rope for modelling the prominence levitation in the corona. These behaviors include the evolution of the equilibrium height of magnetic flux rope with the background magnetic field, the corresponding interior equilibrium of magnetic flux rope, the dynamic properties of magnetic flux rope after the system loses equilibrium, as well as the impact of the reference radius on the equilibrium height of magnetic flux rope. In our calculations, an empirical model of the coronal density distribution given by Sittler & Guhathakurta is used, and the physical dissipation is included. Our experiments show that a deviation between the simulated equilibrium height of magnetic flux rope and the theoretical result of Isenberg et al. exists, but it is not apparent, and the evolutionary features of the two results are similar. If the magnetic flux rope is initially located at the stable branch of the theoretical equilibrium curve, the magnetic flux rope will quickly reach the equilibrium position after several rounds of oscillations as a result of the self-adjustment of the system; when the system is located at the critical point it will quickly lose equilibrium and evolve to the eruptive state; the impact of the variation of reference radius on the equilibrium height of magnetic flux rope is consistent with the prediction of the theory; in the eruptive state, the kinetic properties of magnetic flux rope are consistent with the results given by the Lin-Forbes model and observation, and the fast-mode shock in front of the magnetic flux rope is observed in our experiments; furthermore, because that the dissipation is included in our numerical experiments, the energy conversion from the magnetic energy to other forms of energy is very apparent in the eruptive process.