Are ghost surfaces quadratic-flux-minimizing?

DOI10.1016/J.PHYSLETA.2009.10.005zbMATH Open1234.76060arXiv0909.2096OpenAlexW2114686224MaRDI QIDQ407984FDOQ407984

Authors: S. R. Hudson, R. L. Dewar 

Publication date: 28 March 2012

Published in: Physics Letters. A (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: Two candidates for "almost-invariant" toroidal surfaces passing through magnetic islands, namely quadratic-flux-minimizing (QFMin) surfaces and ghost surfaces, use families of periodic pseudo-orbits (i.e. paths for which the action is not exactly extremal). QFMin pseudo-orbits, which are coordinate-dependent, are field lines obtained from a modified magnetic field, and ghost-surface pseudo-orbits are obtained by displacing closed field lines in the direction of steepest descent of magnetic action, $ointvecAcdotmathbfdl$. A generalized Hamiltonian definition of ghost surfaces is given and specialized to the usual Lagrangian definition. A modified Hamilton's Principle is introduced that allows the use of Lagrangian integration for calculation of the QFMin pseudo-orbits. Numerical calculations show QFMin and Lagrangian ghost surfaces give very similar results for a chaotic magnetic field perturbed from an integrable case, and this is explained using a perturbative construction of an auxiliary poloidal angle for which QFMin and Lagrangian ghost surfaces are the same up to second order. While presented in the context of 3-dimensional magnetic field line systems, the concepts are applicable to defining almost-invariant tori in other $11/2$ degree-of-freedom nonintegrable Lagrangian/Hamiltonian systems.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/0909.2096

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zbMATH Keywords

Hamiltonian dynamicsLagrangian dynamicsalmost-invariant toritoroidal magnetic fields

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Lagrange's equations (70H03) Hamilton's equations (70H05) Quasi-periodic motions and invariant tori for nonlinear problems in mechanics (70K43) Motion of charged particles (78A35) Obstructions to integrability for finite-dimensional Hamiltonian and Lagrangian systems (nonintegrability criteria) (37J30) Ionized gas flow in electromagnetic fields; plasmic flow (76X05) Ion traps (78A37)

Cites Work

• Variational time integrators
• Title not available (Why is that?)
• Symplectic twist maps. Global variational techniques
• Title not available (Why is that?)
• Rational quadratic-flux minimizing circles for area-preserving twist maps
• Symplectic maps, variational principles, and transport

Cited In (2)

• Action-gradient-minimizing pseudo-orbits and almost-invariant tori
• Understanding quasi-periodic fieldlines and their topology in toroidal magnetic fields

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