The Anisotropic Transport Effects On The Dilute Plasmas

TL;DR

This paper introduces a new linear instability called GvMRI in dilute plasmas, driven by gyroviscosity and differential rotation, which can be more influential than existing instabilities like MTI and MRI in astrophysical contexts.

Contribution

The study derives the dispersion relation for GvMRI, a novel instability in dilute plasmas, expanding understanding of plasma behavior in astrophysical environments.

Findings

Identified GvMRI as a more powerful instability than MTI and MRI in dilute plasmas.

GvMRI is independent of temperature gradient direction, unlike previous instabilities.

Analyzed the dependence of GvMRI on magnetic field geometry, gyroviscosity, and thermal parameters.

Abstract

We examine the linear stability analysis of a hot, dilute and differentially rotating plasma by considering anisotropic transport effects. In the dilute plasmas, the ion Larmor radius is small compared with its collisional mean free path. In this case, the transport of heat and momentum along the magnetic field lines become important. This paper presents a novel linear instability that may more powerful and greater than ideal magnetothermal instability (MTI) and ideal magnetorotational instability (MRI) in the dilute astrophysical plasmas. This type of plasma is believed to be found in the intracluster medium of galaxy clusters and radiatively ineffective accretion flows around black holes. We derive the dispersion relation of this instability and obtain the instability condition. There is at least one unstable mode that is independent of the temperature gradient direction for a helical magnetic field geometry. This novel instability is driven by the gyroviscosity coupled with differential rotation. Therefore we call it as gyroviscous modified magnetorotational instability (GvMRI). We examine how the instability depends on signs of the temperature gradient and the gyroviscosity, and also on the magnitude of the thermal frequency and on the values of the pitch angle. We provide a detailed physical interpretation of obtained results. The GvMRI is applicable not only to the accretion flows and intracluster medium but also to the transition region between cool dense gas and the hot low-density plasma in stellar coronae, accretion disks, and the multiphase interstellar medium because of being independent of the temperature gradient direction.