Taylor-Couette flow for astrophysical purposes
arXiv:2212.08741 · doi:10.1098/rsta.2022.0119
Abstract
A concise review is given of astrophysically motivated experimental and theoretical research on Taylor-Couette flow. The flows of interest rotate differentially with inner cylinder faster than outer one but are linearly stable against Rayleigh's inviscid centrifugal instability. At shear Reynolds numbers as large as 10^6, hydrodynamic flows of this type (quasi-keplerian) appear to be nonlinearly stable: no turbulence is seen that cannot be attributed to interaction with the axial boundaries, rather than the radial shear itself. Direct numerical simulations agree, although they cannot yet reach such high Reynolds numbers. This result indicates that accretion-disc turbulence is not purely hydrodynamic in origin, at least insofar as it is driven by radial shear. Theory, however, predicts linear magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) instabilities in astrophysical discs: in particular, the standard magnetorotational instability (SMRI). MHD Taylor-Couette experiments aimed at SMRI are challenged by the low magnetic Prandtl numbers of liquid metals. High fluid Reynolds numbers and careful control of the axial boundaries are required. The quest for laboratory SMRI has been rewarded with the discovery of some interesting inductionless cousins of SMRI, and the recently reported success in demonstrating SMRI itself by taking advantage of conducting axial boundaries. Some outstanding questions and near-future prospects are discussed, especially in connection with astrophysics.
17 pages, 6 figures, and 2 tables, accepted as part of Theme issue: Taylor-Couette and Related Flows on the Centennial of Taylor's Seminal Philosophical Transactions Paper in Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A
References in corpus (59)
- The Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP): I. Motivation, Sample, Calibration, and Overview
- Hydrodynamic turbulence cannot transport angular momentum effectively in astrophysical disks
- Experimental observation and characterization of the magnetorotational instability
- Magnetorotational Instability in a Rotating Liquid Metal Annulus
- Experimental evidence for magnetorotational instability in a helical magnetic field
- New type of magneto-rotational instability in cylindrical Taylor-Couette flow
- Local Hydrodynamic Stability of Accretion Disks
- On the relevance of subcritical hydrodynamic turbulence to accretion disk transport
- Measurement of angular momentum transport in turbulent flow between independently rotating cylinders
- Stability and angular-momentum transport of fluid flows between corotating cylinders
- Helical magnetorotational instability in a Taylor-Couette flow with strongly reduced Ekman pumping
- Helical Magnetorotational Instability in Magnetized Taylor-Couette Flow
- Magnetorotational instability of dissipative Couette flow
- Non-axisymmetric Magnetorotational Instabilities in Cylindrical Taylor-Couette Flow
- Experimental evidence for non-axisymmetric magnetorotational instability in a rotating liquid metal exposed to an azimuthal magnetic field
- MHD instability in differentially rotating cylindric flows
- Formation and Evolution of Disks around Young Stellar Objects
- Observation of magnetocoriolis waves in a liquid metal Taylor-Couette experiment
- Magnetorotational Instability in Liquid Metal Couette Flow
- Viscous, Resistive Magnetorotational Modes
- Turbulence in differentially rotating flows What can be learned from the Couette-Taylor experiment
- Instabilities in magnetized spherical Couette flow
- Local instabilities in magnetized rotational flows: A short-wavelength approach
- Stability of quasi-Keplerian shear flow in a laboratory experiment
- Angular momentum transport and turbulence in laboratory models of Keplerian flows
- Nonlinear stability of laboratory quasi-Keplerian flows
- Numerical and Experimental Investigation of Circulation in Short Cylinders
- Numerical simulations of the Princeton magneto-rotational instability experiment with conducting axial boundaries
- Simulations of Magnetorotational Instability in a Magnetized Couette Flow
- Observation of a Free-Shercliff-Layer Instability in Cylindrical Geometry
- Stirring Unmagnetized Plasma
- Magnetic instability in a sheared azimuthal flow
- Boundary-layer turbulence in experiments of quasi-Keplerian flows
- Supersonic Shear Instabilities in Astrophysical Boundary Layers
- Turbulence decay towards the linearly-stable regime of Taylor-Couette flow
- Observation of axisymmetric standard magnetorotational instability in the laboratory
- The role of boundaries in the MagnetoRotational Instability
- A Taylor-Couette Dynamo
- Traveling waves in magnetized Taylor-Couette flow
- On the nonlinear saturation of the magnetorotational instability near threshold in a thin-gap Taylor-Couette setup
- Identification of a non-axisymmetric mode in laboratory experiments searching for standard magnetorotational instability
- Hydrodynamic turbulence in quasi-Keplerian rotating flows
- Analog of Astrophysical Magnetorotational Instability in a Couette-Taylor Flow of Polymer Fluids
- End-effects in rapidly rotating cylindrical Taylor-Couette flow
- Routes to turbulence in Taylor-Couette flow
- Weakly magnetized, Hall dominated plasma Couette flow
- Numerical Study of the Magnetorotational Instability in Princeton MRI Experiment
- Reynolds number scaling of influence of boundary layers on the global behavior of laboratory quasi-Keplerian flows
- The Influence of Horizontal Boundaries on Ekman Circulation and Angular Momentum Transport in a Cylindrical Annulus
- Boundary Layers of Accretion Disks: Discovery of Vortex-Driven Modes and Other Waves
- Azimuthal velocity profiles in Rayleigh-stable Taylor-Couette flow and implied axial angular momentum transport
- Two types of axisymmetric helical magnetorotational instability in rotating flows with positive shear
- The weakly nonlinear magnetorotational instability in a global, cylindrical Taylor-Couette flow
- Experiments and long-term High Performance Computations on amplitude modulations of strato-rotational flows
- The Magnetorotational Instability Prefers Three Dimensions
- Turbulence in electromagnetically-driven Keplerian flows
- Nonlinear evolution of magnetorotational instability in a magnetized Taylor-Couette flow: scaling properties and relation to upcoming DRESDYN-MRI experiment
- Magnetorotational Instability in a Swirling Partially Ionized Gas
- Angular Momentum Transport by Keplerian Turbulence in Liquid Metals