Magnetohydrodynamics

Abstract

In the previous chapter we have discussed the motion of individual charged particles in prescribed E- and B-fields. Magnetohydrodynamics is different for two reasons: (a) it considers many particles instead of just a single particle and (b) the E- and B-fields are not prescribed but determined by the positions and motions of the particles. Thus the field equations and the equation of motion have to be solved simultaneously and self-consistently: we are looking for a set of particle trajectories and field patterns such that the particles generate the field patterns as they move along their orbits and the field patterns force the particles to move in exactly these orbits. And all this has to be done in a time-varying situation.

‘Glorious stirring sight!’ murmured Toad, never offering to move. ‘The poetry of motion! The real way to travel! The only way to travel!’

K. Grahame, The Wind in the Willows