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Lorentz invariant ‘potential magnetic field’ and magnetic flux conservation in an ideal relativistic plasma

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2018

F. Pegoraro*
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, University of Pisa, largo Pontecorvo 3, 56127 Pisa, Italy
*
Email address for correspondence: francesco.pegoraro@unipi.it

Abstract

A family of Lorentz invariant scalar functions of the magnetic field is defined in an ideal relativistic plasma. These invariants are advected by the plasma fluid motion and play the role of the potential magnetic field introduced by Hide in (Ann. Geophys., vol. 1, 1983, 59) along the lines of Ertel’s theorem. From these invariants we recover the Cauchy conditions for the magnetic field components in the mapping from Eulerian to Lagrangian variables. In addition, the adopted procedure allows us to formulate, in a Lorentz invariant form, the Alfvén theorem for the conservation of the magnetic flux through a surface comoving with the plasma.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2018 

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