Nonlinear growth of firehose and mirror fluctuations in astrophysical plasmas |
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Authors: | Schekochihin A A Cowley S C Kulsrud R M Rosin M S Heinemann T |
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Affiliation: | Plasma Physics, Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom. a.schekochihin@imperial.ac.uk |
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Abstract: | In turbulent high-beta astrophysical plasmas (exemplified by the galaxy cluster plasmas), pressure-anisotropy-driven firehose and mirror fluctuations grow nonlinearly to large amplitudes, deltaB/B approximately 1, on a time scale comparable to the turnover time of the turbulent motions. The principle of their nonlinear evolution is to generate secularly growing small-scale magnetic fluctuations that on average cancel the temporal change in the large-scale magnetic field responsible for the pressure anisotropies. The presence of small-scale magnetic fluctuations may dramatically affect the transport properties and, thereby, the large-scale dynamics of the high-beta astrophysical plasmas. |
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