Thermoelectric magnetohydrodynamics

Abstract

Thermoelectric currents in the presence of magnetic fields can cause pumping or stirring of liquid-metal coolants in nuclear reactors or stirring of molten metal in industrial metallurgy. The interaction between the thermal and magnetohydrodynamic fields is a mutual one owing to alterations in the thermal convection and to the Peltier and Thomson effects (although these are usually small). This paper sets up the equations of magnetohydrodynamics and thermal convection when coupled by thermoelectricity and solves some illustrative problems in which the thermal field is known ab initio. Examples where the effects are due to either continuous or discontinuous variation of material composition are included. Practical magnitudes are discussed for the case of a fusion-reactor blanket, where the effects are potentially important owing to the unusual thermoelectric power of lithium.