Streaming instabilities in weakly ionized protoplanetary discs: the Ambipolar Streaming Instability (AmSI)

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Pierens, Arnaud, Lin, Min-Kai
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2026
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author Pierens, Arnaud
Lin, Min-Kai
author_facet Pierens, Arnaud
Lin, Min-Kai
contents The regions of protoplanetary discs where planets can form are believed to be weakly ionised, suggesting thereby that non-ideal magneto-hydrodynamics (MHD) effects play an important role in the disc dynamics and in the planet formation process. In particular, the combined effect of ohmic resistivity and ambipolar diffusion can be responsible for launching MHD-driven disc winds. In this context, we focus on the effect of ambipolar diffusion (AD) and examine the stability of a dusty, magnetized disc by employing both linear stability analyses and numerical simulations. We show that dust feedback tends to stabilize the MRI oblique modes involved in the ambipolar-shear instability. We also find that ambipolar diffusion leads to the onset of a strong resonant drag instability (RDI), in which an Alfvén wave is destabilized by the relative drift between the gas and dust components. The main impact of AD is to modify the Alfvén wave frequency, resulting in a large resonance width. The instability is found to have significant growth rates even in dust-poor discs and for tightly coupled particles, which may help to bridge the gap between growth of dust grains through coagulation and planetesimal formation.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_11262
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Streaming instabilities in weakly ionized protoplanetary discs: the Ambipolar Streaming Instability (AmSI)
Pierens, Arnaud
Lin, Min-Kai
Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
The regions of protoplanetary discs where planets can form are believed to be weakly ionised, suggesting thereby that non-ideal magneto-hydrodynamics (MHD) effects play an important role in the disc dynamics and in the planet formation process. In particular, the combined effect of ohmic resistivity and ambipolar diffusion can be responsible for launching MHD-driven disc winds. In this context, we focus on the effect of ambipolar diffusion (AD) and examine the stability of a dusty, magnetized disc by employing both linear stability analyses and numerical simulations. We show that dust feedback tends to stabilize the MRI oblique modes involved in the ambipolar-shear instability. We also find that ambipolar diffusion leads to the onset of a strong resonant drag instability (RDI), in which an Alfvén wave is destabilized by the relative drift between the gas and dust components. The main impact of AD is to modify the Alfvén wave frequency, resulting in a large resonance width. The instability is found to have significant growth rates even in dust-poor discs and for tightly coupled particles, which may help to bridge the gap between growth of dust grains through coagulation and planetesimal formation.
title Streaming instabilities in weakly ionized protoplanetary discs: the Ambipolar Streaming Instability (AmSI)
topic Earth and Planetary Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.11262