The baroclinic instability in the context of layered accretion. Self-sustained vortices and their magnetic stability in local compressible unstratified models of protoplanetary disks (original) (raw)
The baroclinic instability in the context of layered accretion
Astronomy & Astrophysics, 2011
Context. Turbulence and angular momentum transport in accretion disks remains a topic of debate. With the realization that dead zones are robust features of protoplanetary disks, the search for hydrodynamical sources of turbulence continues. A possible source is the baroclinic instability (BI), which has been shown to exist in unmagnetized non-barotropic disks. Aims. We aim to verify the existence of the baroclinic instability in 3D magnetized disks, as well as its interplay with other instabilities, namely the magneto-rotational instability (MRI) and the magneto-elliptical instability. Methods. We performed local simulations of non-isothermal accretion disks with the PENCIL CODE. The entropy gradient that generates the baroclinic instability is linearized and included in the momentum and energy equations in the shearing box approximation. The model is compressible, so excitation of spiral density waves is allowed and angular momentum transport can be measured. Results. We find that the vortices generated and sustained by the baroclinic instability in the purely hydrodynamical regime do not survive when magnetic fields are included. The MRI by far supersedes the BI in growth rate and strength at saturation. The resulting turbulence is virtually identical to an MRI-only scenario. We measured the intrinsic vorticity profile of the vortex, finding little radial variation in the vortex core. Nevertheless, the core is disrupted by an MHD instability, which we identify with the magneto-elliptic instability. This instability has nearly the same range of unstable wavelengths as the MRI, but has higher growth rates. In fact, we identify the MRI as a limiting case of the magneto-elliptic instability, when the vortex aspect ratio tends to infinity (pure shear flow). We isolated its effect on the vortex, finding that a strong but unstable vertical magnetic field leads to channel flows inside the vortex, which stretch it apart. When the field is decreased or resistivity is used, we find that the vortex survives until the MRI develops in the box. The vortex is then destroyed by the strain of the surrounding turbulence. Constant azimuthal fields and zero net flux fields also lead to vortex destruction. Resistivity quenches both instabilities when the magnetic Reynolds number of the longest vertical wavelength of the box is near unity. Conclusions. We conclude that vortex excitation and self-sustenance by the baroclinic instability in protoplanetary disks is viable only in low ionization, i.e., the dead zone. Our results are thus in accordance with the layered accretion paradigm. A baroclinicly unstable dead zone should be characterized by the presence of large-scale vortices whose cores are elliptically unstable, yet sustained by the baroclinic feedback. Since magnetic fields destroy the vortices and the MRI outweighs the BI, the active layers are unmodified.
Fully compressible simulations of the baroclinic instability in protoplanetary disks
EPJ Web of Conferences, 2013
The occurrence of the baroclinic instability in protoplanetary disks is investigated using fully compressible numerical simulations. We study the role of disk stratification and heat transfer in the development of the instability. Vortices are found to form whatever the importance of the stratification but to grow and persist only when the disk is not stably stratified. In the presence of thermal diffusion the baroclinic instability leads to hollow vortices that decays into transient vortical structures.
The Astrophysical Journal, 2013
We use local numerical simulations to investigate the strength and nature of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence in the outer regions of protoplanetary disks, where ambipolar diffusion is the dominant non-ideal MHD effect. The simulations include vertical stratification and assume zero net vertical magnetic flux. We employ a super time-stepping technique to ameliorate the Courant restriction on the diffusive time step. We find that in idealized stratified simulations, with a spatially constant ambipolar Elsasser number Am, turbulence driven by the magnetorotational instability (MRI) behaves in a similar manner as in prior unstratified calculations. Turbulence dies away for Am 1, and becomes progressively more vigorous as ambipolar diffusion is decreased. Near-ideal MHD behavior is recovered for Am 10 3 . In the intermediate regime (10 Am 10 3 ) ambipolar diffusion leads to substantial increases in both the period of the MRI dynamo cycle and the characteristic scales of magnetic field structures. To quantify the impact of ambipolar physics on disk accretion, we run simulations at 30 AU and 100 AU that include a vertical Am profile based upon far-ultraviolet (FUV) ionized disk models. These models develop a vertically layered structure analogous to the Ohmic dead zone that is present at smaller radii. We find that, although the levels of surface turbulence can be strong (and consistent with constraints on turbulent line widths at these radii), the inferred accretion rates are at least an order of magnitude smaller than those observed in T Tauri stars. This discrepancy is very likely due to the assumption of zero vertical magnetic field in our simulations and suggests that vertical magnetic fields are essential for MRI-driven accretion in the outer regions of protoplanetary disks.
Instability, turbulence, and enhanced transport in accretion disks
Reviews of Modern Physics, 1998
Recent years have witnessed dramatic progress in our understanding of how turbulence arises and transports angular momentum in astrophysical accretion disks. The key conceptual point has its origins in work dating from the 1950s, but its implications have been fully understood only in the last several years: the combination of a subthermal magnetic field (any nonpathological configuration will do) and outwardly decreasing differential rotation rapidly generates magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence via a remarkably simple linear instability. The result is a greatly enhanced effective viscosity, the origin of which had been a long-standing problem. The MHD nature of disk turbulence has linked two broad domains of magnetized fluid research: accretion theory and dynamos. The understanding that weak magnetic fields are not merely passively acted upon by turbulence, but actively generate it, means that the assumptions of classical dynamo theory break down in disks. Paralleling the new conceptual understanding has been the development of powerful numerical MHD codes. These have taught us that disks truly are turbulent, transporting angular momentum at greatly enhanced rates. We have also learned, however, that not all forms of disk turbulence do this. Purely hydrodynamic turbulence, when it is imposed, simply causes fluctuations without a significant increase in transport. The interplay between numerical simulation and analytic arguments has been particularly fruitful in accretion disk theory and is a major focus of this article. The authors conclude with a summary of what is now known of disk turbulence and mention some knotty outstanding questions (e.g., what is the physics behind nonlinear field saturation?) for which we may soon begin to develop answers. [S0034-6861(98)00501-7] CONTENTS 42 5. The evolution of an initially random field 42 6. Shear vs vorticity 43 7. Density stratification 44 C. MHD simulations: a summary 45 VI. Accretion Disk Dynamos 45 A. The dynamo-electric machine 45 B. A brief review of mean-field dynamo theory 46 C. Mean-field theory and nonlinear evolution of the magnetorotational instability 47 D. Saturation 49 VII. Summary 50 Acknowledgments 50 References 51
Global magnetohydrodynamical models of turbulence in protoplanetary disks
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2008
Aims. We present global 3D MHD simulations of disks of gas and solids, aiming at developing models that can be used to study various scenarios of planet formation and planet-disk interaction in turbulent accretion disks. Methods. We employ the PENCIL CODE, a 3D high-order finite-difference MHD code using Cartesian coordinates. We solve the equations of ideal MHD with a local isothermal equation of state. Planets and stars are treated as particles evolved with an N-body scheme. Solid boulders are treated as individual superparticles that couple to the gas through a drag force that is linear in the local relative velocity between gas and particle. Results. We find that Cartesian grids are well-suited for accretion disk problems. The disk-in-a-box models based on Cartesian grids presented here develop and sustain MHD turbulence, in good agreement with published results achieved with cylindrical codes.We investigate the dependence of the magnetorotational instability on disk scale height, finding evidence that the turbulence generated by the magnetorotational instability grows with thermal pressure. The turbulent stresses depend on the thermal pressure obeying a power law of 0.24 ± 0.03, compatible with the value of 0.25 found in shearing box calculations. The ratio of Maxwell to Reynolds stresses decreases with increasing temperature, dropping from 5 to 1 when the sound speed was raised by a factor 4, maintaing the same field strength. We also study the dynamics of solid boulders in the hydromagnetic turbulence, by making use of 10 6 Lagrangian particles embedded in the Eulerian grid. The effective diffusion provided by the turbulence prevents settling of the solids in a infinitesimally thin layer, forming instead a layer of solids of finite vertical thickness. The measured scale height of this diffusion-supported layer of solids implies turbulent vertical diffusion coefficients with globally averaged Schmidt numbers of 1.0±0.2 for a model with α ≈ 10 −3 and 0.78±0.06 for a model with α ≈ 10 −1 . That is, the vertical turbulent diffusion acting on the solids phase is comparable to the turbulent viscosity acting on the gas phase. The average bulk density of solids in the turbulent flow is quite low (ρ p =6.0 × 10 −11 kg m −3 ), but in the high pressure regions, significant overdensities are observed, where the solid-to-gas ratio reached values as great as 85, corresponding to 4 orders of magnitude higher than the initial interstellar value of 0.01
The Astrophysical Journal, 2011
We present full 2π global three-dimensional stratified magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations of accretion disks. We interpret our results in the context of protoplanetary disks. We investigate the turbulence driven by the magnetorotational instability (MRI) using the PLUTO Godunov code in spherical coordinates with the accurate and robust HLLD Riemann solver. We follow the turbulence for more than 1500 orbits at the innermost radius of the domain to measure the overall strength of turbulent motions and the detailed accretion flow pattern. We find that regions within two scale heights of the midplane have a turbulent Mach number of about 0.1 and a magnetic pressure two to three orders of magnitude less than the gas pressure, while in those outside three scale heights the magnetic pressure equals or exceeds the gas pressure and the turbulence is transonic, leading to large density fluctuations. The strongest large-scale density disturbances are spiral density waves, and the strongest of these waves has m = 5. No clear meridional circulation appears in the calculations because fluctuating radial pressure gradients lead to changes in the orbital frequency, comparable in importance to the stress gradients that drive the meridional flows in viscous models. The net mass flow rate is well reproduced by a viscous model using the mean stress distribution taken from the MHD calculation. The strength of the mean turbulent magnetic field is inversely proportional to the radius, so the fields are approximately force-free on the largest scales. Consequently, the accretion stress falls off as the inverse square of the radius.
Magnetically driven accretion in protoplanetary discs
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 2015
We characterize magnetically driven accretion at radii between 1 and 100 au in protoplanetary discs, using a series of local non-ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations. The simulations assume a minimum mass solar nebula (MMSN) disc that is threaded by a net vertical magnetic field of specified strength. Confirming previous results, we find that the Hall effect has only a modest impact on accretion at 30 au, and essentially none at 100 au. At 1-10 au the Hall effect introduces a pronounced bimodality in the accretion process, with vertical magnetic fields aligned to the disc rotation supporting a strong laminar Maxwell stress that is absent if the field is anti-aligned. In the anti-aligned case, we instead find evidence for bursts of turbulent stress at 5-10 au, which we tentatively identify with the non-axisymmetric Hall-shear instability. The presence or absence of these bursts depends upon the details of the adopted chemical model, which suggests that appreciable regions of actual protoplanetary discs might lie close to the borderline between laminar and turbulent behaviour. Given the number of important control parameters that have already been identified in MHD models, quantitative predictions for disc structure in terms of only radius and accretion rate appear to be difficult. Instead, we identify robust qualitative tests of magnetically driven accretion. These include the presence of turbulence in the outer disc, independent of the orientation of the vertical magnetic fields, and a Hall-mediated bimodality in turbulent properties extending from the region of thermal ionization to 10 au.
Vortices in stratified protoplanetary disks
Astronomy & Astrophysics, 2016
Context. Large-scale vortices could play a key role in the evolution of protoplanetary disks, particularly in the dead-zone where no turbulence associated with magnetic field is expected. Their possible formation by the subcritical baroclinic instability is a complex issue because of the vertical structure of the disk and the elliptical instability. Aims. In 2D disks the baroclinic instability is studied as a function of the thermal transfer efficiency. In 3D disks we explore the importance of radial and vertical stratification on the processes of vortex formation and amplification. Methods. Numerical simulations are performed using a fully compressible hydrodynamical code based on a second-order finite volume method. We assume a perfect gas law in inviscid disk models in which heat transfer is due to either relaxation or diffusion. Results. In 2D, the baroclinic instability with thermal relaxation leads to the formation of large-scale vortices, which are unstable with respect to the elliptic instability. In the presence of heat diffusion, hollow vortices are formed which evolve into vortical structures with a turbulent core. In 3D, the disk stratification is found to be unstable in a finite layer which can include the mid-plane or not. When the unstable layer contains the mid-plane, the 3D baroclinic instability with thermal relaxation is found to develop first in the unstable layer as in 2D, producing large-scale vortices. These vortices are then stretched out in the stable layer, creating long-lived columnar vortical structures extending through the width of the disk. They are also found to be the source of internal vortex layers that develop across the whole disk along baroclinic critical layer surfaces, and form new vortices in the upper region of the disk. Conclusions. In 3D disks, vortices can survive for a very long time if the production of vorticity by the baroclinic amplification balances the destruction of vorticity by the elliptical instability. However, this possibility is strongly dependent on the disk properties. Such baroclinic vortices could play a significant role in the global disk evolution and in participating to the decoupling of solids from the gas component. They could also contribute to the formation of new out-of-plane vortices by a critical layer excitation mechanism.
Baroclinic Vorticity Production in Protoplanetary Disks. I. Vortex Formation
The Astrophysical Journal, 2007
The factors affecting vortex growth in convectively stable protoplanetary disks are explored using numerical simulations of a two-dimensional anelastic-gas model that includes baroclinic vorticity production and radiative cooling. The baroclinic feedback, in which anomalous temperature gradients produce vorticity through the baroclinic term and vortices then reinforce these temperature gradients, is found to be an important process in the rate of growth of vortices in the disk. Factors that strengthen the baroclinic feedback include fast radiative cooling, high thermal diffusion, and large radial temperature gradients in the background temperature. When the baroclinic feedback is sufficiently strong, anticyclonic vortices form from initial random perturbations and maintain their strength for the duration of the simulation, for over 600 orbital periods. Based on both simulations and a simple vortex model, we find that the local angular momentum transport due to a single vortex may be inward or outward, depending on its orientation. The global angular momentum transport is highly variable in time and is sometimes negative and sometimes positive. This result is for an anelastic-gas model and does not include shocks that could affect angular momentum transport in a compressible-gas disk.
Magnetohydrodynamic Simulations of Global Accretion Disks with Vertical Magnetic Fields
The Astrophysical Journal, 2014
We report results of three dimensional mangetohydrodynamical (MHD) simulations of global accretion disks threaded with weak vertical magnetic fields. We perform the simulations in the spherical coordinates with different temperature profiles and accordingly different rotation profiles. In the cases with a spatially constant temperature, because the rotation frequency is vertically constant in the equilibrium condition, general properties of the turbulence excited by magnetorotational instability (MRI) are quantitatively similar to those obtained in local shearing box simulations. On the other hand, in the cases with a radially variable temperature profile, the vertical differential rotation, which is inevitable in the equilibrium condition, winds up the magnetic field lines, in addition to the usual radial differential rotation. As a result, the coherent wound magnetic fields contribute to the Maxwell stress in the surface regions. Our global simulations give somewhat larger density fluctuation, δρ/ρ = 0.1 − 0.2, near the midplane than the values obtained in previous local shearing box simulations and global simulations without net vertical magnetic field. The velocity fluctuations, dominated by the radial component, are ≈ 0.1 − 0.2 of the local sound speed. The azimuthal power spectra of the magnetic fields show shallow slopes, ∝ m 0 ∼ m −1 , where m is an azimuthal mode number, which might be related to the energy injection by MRI from small scales. On the other hand, the power spectra of the velocities and density show steeper slopes, ∝ m −1 ∼ m −2 . We observe intermittent and structured disk winds driven by the Poynting flux associated with the MHD turbulence, with the slightly smaller mass fluxes than that obtained in our local simulations. The Poynting flux originating from magnetic tension is injected from the regions above a scale height toward both the midplane and the surfaces. Related to this, sound waves are directed to the midplane from the surface regions. The mass accretion mainly occurs near the surfaces and the gas near the midplane slowly moves outward in the time domain of the present simulations. The vertical magnetic fields are also dragged inward in the surface regions, while they stochastically move outward and inward around the midplane. The difference of the velocities at the midplane and the surfaces might cause large-scale meridional circulations. Applying to protoplanetary disks, these waves and circulation are supposed to play an important role in the dynamics of solid particles. We also discuss an observational implication of induced spiral structure in the simulated turbulent disks.