Simultaneous solution for core magnetic field and fluid flow beneath an electrically conducting mantle

Abstract

The effects of laterally homogeneous mantle electrical conductivity have been included in steady, frozen‐flux core surface flow estimation along with refinements in method and weighting. The refined method allows simultaneous solution for both the initial radial geomagnetic field component at the core‐mantle boundary and the subadjacent fluid motion; it also features Gauss' method for solving the nonlinear inverse problem associated with steady motional induction. The trade‐off between spatial complexity of the derived flows and misfit to the weighted Definitive Geomagnetic Reference Field models is studied for various mantle conductivity profiles. For simple flow and a fixed initial geomagnetic condition a fairly high deep‐mantle conductivity performs better than either insulating or weakly conducting profiles; however, a thin, very high conductivity layer at the base of the mantle performs almost as well. Simultaneous solution for both initial geomagnetic field and fluid flow reduces the misfit per degree of freedom even more than does changing the mantle conductivity profile. Moreover, when both core field and flow are estimated, the performance of the solutions and the derived flows become insensitive to the conductivity profile.