Magnetic Pressure-Density Correlation in Compressible MHD Turbulence

Abstract

We discuss magnetic pressure and density fluctuations in strongly turbulent isothermal MHD flows in "1+2/3" dimensions. We first consider "simple" nonlinear MHD waves, which allow us show that the slow and fast modes have different asymptotic dependences of the magnetic pressure B^2 vs. rho. For the slow mode, B^2 ~= c_1-c_2 rho, while for the fast mode, B^2 ~= rho^2. We also perform a perturbative analysis to investigate Alfven wave pressure, recovering previous results that B^2 ~= rho^gamma_e, with gamma_e ~= 2, 3/2 and 1/2 at respectively large, moderate and low M_a. This variety of scalings implies that a single polytropic description of magnetic pressure is not possible in general, since the relation between B^2 and rho depends on which mode dominates the density fluctuation production, which in turn depends on the angle between the magnetic field and the direction of wave propagation, and on the Alfvenic Mach number M_a. Typically, at small M_a, the slow mode dominates, and B is ANTIcorrelated with rho. At large M_a, both modes contribute to density fluctuation production, and the magnetic pressure decorrelates from density, exhibiting a large scatter, which however decreases towards higher densities. In this case, the unsystematic behavior of the magnetic pressure causes the density PDF to generally maintain the lognormal shape corresponding to non-magnetic isothermal turbulence, except when the slow mode dominates, in which case the PDF develops an excess at low densities. Our results are consistent with the low values and apparent lack of correlation between the magnetic field strength and density in surveys of the lower-density molecular gas, and also with the recorrelation apparently seen at higher densities, if M_a is relatively large there.