Theory and Modeling of Planetary Dynamos

Abstract

Numerical dynamo models are increasingly successful in modeling many features of the geomagnetic field. Moreover, they have proven to be a useful tool for understanding how the observations connect to the dynamo mechanism. More recently, dynamo simulations have also ventured to explain the surprising diversity of planetary fields found in our solar system. Here, we describe the underlying model equations, concentrating on the Boussinesq approximations, briefly discuss the numerical methods, and give an overview of existing model variations. We explain how the solutions depend on the model parameters and introduce the primary dynamo regimes. Of particular interest is the dependence on the Ekman number which is many orders of magnitude too large in the models for numerical reasons. We show that a minor change in the solution seems to happen at $\mbox {E}=3\mbox {$\times 10^{-6}$}$ whose significance, however, needs to be explored in the future. We also review three topics that have been a focus of recent research: field reversal mechanisms, torsional oscillations, and the influence of Earth’s thermal mantle structure on the dynamo. Finally we discuss the possibility of tidally or precession driven planetary dynamos.