Angular Momentum Transport and Magnetic Fields in the Solar Interior

Abstract

AbstractThe possible mechanisms of angular momentum transport in convectively stable regions of a star are reviewed, with emphasis on transport by magnetic torques. The strength and configuration of the field in such layers is quite uncertain, because it is not known if the field can reach a dynamically stable configuration. A lower limit to the field strength is obtained by assuming that the field is always dynamically unstable, and decaying at the (rotation modified) dynamical time scale. The present field in the sun would then be of the order 1G, with poloidal and toroidal components of similar strength. The differential rotation in the core, if due only to the solar wind torque, would be very small for this field strength, and instead would more likely be governed by magnetic coulpling to the differential rotation of the convection zone. If small scale hydrodynamic transport mechanisms are present, their properties would also be influenced by a field of this strength.