Hydromagnetic stability of a current-carrying pinch with noncircular cross section

Abstract

The hydrodynamic stability of a free-boundary pinch with noncircular cross section is investigated. The analysis is restricted to nonflute modes. The stability conditions for a pinch with elliptical cross section and flat current density are obtained. For arbitrary shapes and current profiles, an asymptotic stability criterion is given for kink and tearing modes of large azimuthal wavenumbers.