Magnetodydrodynamic waves in the solar atmosphere
Not stated
- Funding
- Self-Funded PhD Students Only
- Application deadline
- Year-round applications
About the project
About the Project State-of-the-art high-resolution ground- and spaced-based telescopes routinely observe magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) waves that are ubiquitous in the solar atmosphere. MHD waves and oscillations are very important as they have dominant contribution to the local plasma heating in the solar atmosphere, that is one of the key and unsolved puzzles of modern plasma-astrophysics. Another key aspect of solar atmospheric MHD wave research is that these waves are often used to diagnose the magnetised and very dynamic solar plasma. This project is to further the currently available MHD wave theory in inhomogeneous, expanding waveguides that have steady flows. Wave propagation and instability theory will be developed and applied to a number of solar structures from pores, magnetic bright points to solar jets, called spicules. The study will involve mathematical modelling complemented with observational data analysis using high spatial, temporal and spectral resolution solar telescopes, e.g. data from SST and DKIST. The developed MHD wave theory will be justified by validating the obtained analytical results with these observational data, or theory refuted if necessary. This project requires excellent skills in mathematical modelling complemented with potential interest in taking observations by either ground- or space-based telescope. Further, the project also likely requires collaboration with colleagues from the Solar Physics and Space Plasma Research Centre (SP2RC), a cross-Faculty research entity at the University of Sheffield (UK).