Conformal Geometry in Magnetic Relaxation
Oliver Gross (TU Berlin - Germany)
Abstract: The magnetic relaxation problem studies the self-organization of magnetic field lines in a perfectly conducting fluid to a steady state. In this talk I will discuss such a process from the perspective of conformal geometry. A key insight is the conformal equivalence between force-free magnetic fields and so-called geodesible vector fields. Building on this insight, I will discuss a computational approach to magnetic relaxation that is driven only by local geometry optimization. The method is based on a structure-preserving discretization for pressure-confined regions of an ideal plasma with free boundary conditions, which is represented by a collection of thickness curves interacting with each other. This is joint work with Albert Chern (UC San Diego, CA, USA), Ulrich Pinkall (TU Berlin, Germany) and Peter Schröder (Caltech, Pasadena, CA USA).
geometric topology
Audience: researchers in the topic
Series comments: Web-seminar series on Applications of Geometry and Topology
| Organizers: | Alicia Dickenstein, José-Carlos Gómez-Larrañaga, Kathryn Hess, Neza Mramor-Kosta, Renzo Ricca*, De Witt L. Sumners |
| *contact for this listing |