The General Richtmyer-Meshkov Instability in Magnetohydrodynamics (2012-2016)

The Richtmyer-Meshkov instability plays a key role in inertial confinement fusion, which promises carbon-free energy production, fuel-air mixing in scramjets and astrophysical phenomena. The fluids involved may be ionized and thus affected by magnetic fields. For two highly idealized situations, it has been shown that the instability can be suppressed by a magnetic field, which may be of great benefit. We propose to investigate the instability for the full range of magnetic field orientations that may occur, and to study the effects of finite conductivity and viscosity. Both theoretical modelling and state-of-the-art numerical simulation will be utilized. The result will be a greatly broadened knowledge of this important instability.