| Abstract: | In an experimental study of the heat transfer from a partially ionized gas it was found that the heat flux to the wall for flow of an electrically conducting gas in a circular tube located in a magnetic field of a solenoid depends not only on the magnitude of the magnetic field but also on the field orientation 1]; with the magnetic field parallel to the velocity the heat transfer is reduced by 15%, with antiparallel orientation it is reduced by only 1% in comparison with the heat transfer without the magnetic field. No explanation for this was given either in 1] or in the subsequent discussion 2]; moreover, on the basis of the constructed equations 1] this effect cannot be obtained at all, since the solution of the equations clearly is not changed by a change of the field sign.
In the following we attempt to explain this effect by the processes which take place during the development of rotational flow of an anisotropically conducting medium. The idea of the possibility of such an explanation for this effect was proposed in general form in the survey paper 3].The detailed calculation of the development of MHD flows has been made previously only for the case of a transverse magnetic field and very simple channel geometry (see, for example, the survey 3]).In all the considered problems the components of the electrical field which appeared in the motion equations were known with an accuracy to constants from symmetry considerations. Therefore, under the assumption of smallness of the induced magnetic field these problems reduced simply to the solution of the equation of motion with additional terms which are linear in the velocity. In the present paper we construct an approximate simultaneous solution of a system consisting of the motion equations and the equation for the electrical potential. |
