Magnetic buoyancy instabilities incorporating rotation

Abstract

Recent calculations suggest that the bulk of the solar toroidal field may be stored in a thin, convectively stable region situated between the convection zone proper and the radiative zone. Determining the stability properties of such a field is therefore important with implications for both the generation and escape of magnetic flux. The plane layer, linear stability analysis of Hughes (1985) is extended to incorporate the effects of uniform rotation. Detailed studies are made of interchange, or “axisymmetric” modes and of undular, or wavelike, motions, considering modes of both low and high frequency. The force due to rotation acts to constrain the fluid motions, a feature which is strongly stabilizing for direct modes, but can, in certain circumstances, be destabilizing for oscillatory motions.

For the interchange modes we show that the instability discussed at length by Hughes (1985), driven by fields increasing with height, is still present and indeed may be enhanced by rotational effects. We also study the more conventional instabilities, discussing the transformation between direct and oscillatory modes and considering in detail some peculiar properties of the oscillatory instabilities.

The more relevant instabilities in an astrophysical context are likely to be undular modes. Previous studies of low frequency modes driven by top heavy field gradients are extended to consider modes of various frequencies for a wide range of parameter values. Of particular interest is the occurrence of two distinct modes of instability for bottom heavy field gradients. We also exhibit some of the peculiar stability boundaries which can result when none of the competing influences in the problem is dominant.