Planetary Dynamos in Evolving Cold Gas Giants

Fuente: arXiv
Enregistré dans:
Détails bibliographiques
Auteurs principaux: Elias-López, Albert, Del Sordo, Fabio, Viganò, Daniele, Soriano-Guerrero, Clàudia, Akgün, Taner, Reboul-Salze, Alexis, Cantiello, Matteo
Format: Preprint
Publié: 2024
Sujets:
Accès en ligne:
Tags: Ajouter un tag
Pas de tags, Soyez le premier à ajouter un tag!
_version_ 1866908341785067520
author Elias-López, Albert
Del Sordo, Fabio
Viganò, Daniele
Soriano-Guerrero, Clàudia
Akgün, Taner
Reboul-Salze, Alexis
Cantiello, Matteo
author_facet Elias-López, Albert
Del Sordo, Fabio
Viganò, Daniele
Soriano-Guerrero, Clàudia
Akgün, Taner
Reboul-Salze, Alexis
Cantiello, Matteo
contents Magnetic fields remain one of the least understood aspects of exoplanetary systems. A deeper understanding of planetary dynamos and the evolution of surface magnetic properties throughout a planet's lifetime is a key scientific purpose, with implications for planetary evolution, habitability, and atmospheric dynamics. This study models the evolution of magnetic fields generated by dynamo action in cold giant gaseous planets. We solve the resistive magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations under anelastic approximation with a 3D pseudo-spectral spherical shell MHD code. We employ 1D thermodynamical hydrostatic profiles taken from gas giant evolutionary models as the background states of our MHD models. Numerical integration leads to saturated dynamo solutions. Such calculations are performed with radial profiles corresponding to different planetary ages so that we can interpret them as different snapshots of the magnetoconvection evolution during the long-term planetary evolution. We characterize magnetic fields across different evolutionary stages of a cold gaseous planet in terms of topology and strength. We find the occurrence of a transition from multipolar to dipolar-dominated dynamo regime throughout the life of a Jovian planet. During the planetary evolution and the cooling down phase, we observe a decrease in the average magnetic field strength near the dynamo surface as $\sim t^{-0.2}-t^{-0.3}$, a trend compatible with previously proposed scaling laws. We also find that some dimensionless parameters evolve differently for the multipolar to dipolar branch, possibly reflecting a force balance change. This approach can be extended to study hot gaseous planets, offering a versatile tool for interpreting the magnetic properties of giant planets.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2412_07551
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Planetary Dynamos in Evolving Cold Gas Giants
Elias-López, Albert
Del Sordo, Fabio
Viganò, Daniele
Soriano-Guerrero, Clàudia
Akgün, Taner
Reboul-Salze, Alexis
Cantiello, Matteo
Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
Magnetic fields remain one of the least understood aspects of exoplanetary systems. A deeper understanding of planetary dynamos and the evolution of surface magnetic properties throughout a planet's lifetime is a key scientific purpose, with implications for planetary evolution, habitability, and atmospheric dynamics. This study models the evolution of magnetic fields generated by dynamo action in cold giant gaseous planets. We solve the resistive magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) equations under anelastic approximation with a 3D pseudo-spectral spherical shell MHD code. We employ 1D thermodynamical hydrostatic profiles taken from gas giant evolutionary models as the background states of our MHD models. Numerical integration leads to saturated dynamo solutions. Such calculations are performed with radial profiles corresponding to different planetary ages so that we can interpret them as different snapshots of the magnetoconvection evolution during the long-term planetary evolution. We characterize magnetic fields across different evolutionary stages of a cold gaseous planet in terms of topology and strength. We find the occurrence of a transition from multipolar to dipolar-dominated dynamo regime throughout the life of a Jovian planet. During the planetary evolution and the cooling down phase, we observe a decrease in the average magnetic field strength near the dynamo surface as $\sim t^{-0.2}-t^{-0.3}$, a trend compatible with previously proposed scaling laws. We also find that some dimensionless parameters evolve differently for the multipolar to dipolar branch, possibly reflecting a force balance change. This approach can be extended to study hot gaseous planets, offering a versatile tool for interpreting the magnetic properties of giant planets.
title Planetary Dynamos in Evolving Cold Gas Giants
topic Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2412.07551