04/30/02
Sulem Pierre-Louis CNRS, Observatoire de la Cote d'Azur
BP 4229 SF2A- PNST-
06304 Nice Cedex 4, France
Presentation 1 : Oral
Alfven wave filamentation (PNST)
P.L. Sulem, T. Passot and D. Laveder
Formation of intense magnetic filaments by transverse collapse of small-amplitude parallel Alfven waves is demonstrated using numerical simulations of the Hall-MHD equations and envelope formalism, both for plane waves and longitudinally homogeneous beams. For wave packets, a minimal longitudinal extension is required for a blowup associated with the formation of anisotropic magnetic structures. Including kinetic effects is feasible in the limit of long Alfven waves and is presently under way. When the wave amplitude is increased, the filaments become helicoidal and a (transverse) "reduced MHD" turbulence develops at large longitudinal scales.