Abstract
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH,
VOL. 110,
B02402,
16 PP., 2005
doi:10.1029/2003JB002915
Viscoelectromagnetic coupling in precession-nutation theory
Viscoelectromagnetic coupling in precession-nutation theory
P. M. Mathews
Department of Theoretical Physics, University of Madras (Guindy Campus), Chennai, India
J. Y. Guo
Key Laboratory of Geospace Environment and Geodesy, Ministry of Education, School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Wuhan University,
Wuhan, China
The estimates made by
Mathews et al. [2002]
for the strengths of magnetic fields at the core mantle boundary and the inner core boundary were based on the not unreasonable
hypothesis that the torques generated by differential wobbles between the fluid core on the one hand and the mantle and the
inner core on the other are due to the magnetic fields crossing the core mantle and inner core boundaries. In this paper,
we investigate the possibility that viscous drag at these boundaries might contribute significantly to the torques. Our objectives
are to find out, first, whether it would become possible, with part of the torques accounted for by viscosity, to reduce the
estimates for the magnetic field strengths at the two boundaries from the values obtained by Mathews et al. to the considerably
lower values that had been favored earlier and, second, whether any bounds can be placed on the fluid viscosity itself. For
this purpose, we have generalized the theory of
Buffett et al. [2002]
to obtain new expressions for the coupling constants representing the torques at the two boundaries which include the effects
due to both electromagnetism and viscosity. With the use of these we find that Mathews et al.'s estimates for the coupling
constants (which are independent of the mechanism of the coupling) place upper bounds on the viscosities at the core mantle
and inner core boundaries. These bounds rule out not only the very high viscosity called for in recent literature relating
to the translational oscillation modes of the inner core but also other earlier estimates, with the exception of those derived
from theoretical and experimental studies on liquid metals. We find also that the magnetic field strength at the inner core
boundary cannot be brought down to anywhere near the levels deduced from geodynamo theories unless the inner core ellipticity
and/or the density jump at the inner core boundary are assigned values that appear unrealistic. Our theoretical formulation
takes the variations of the unperturbed magnetic field and the ambient flow in the fluid core to be on spatial scales that
are large compared to the kilometer-scale thickness of the boundary layers which dominate the coupling of the fluid core to
the mantle and the inner core at the tidal frequencies relevant to nutations. Possible variations on scales of a few kilometers
or less are not taken into account. Such fine-scale maps of the fields are not obtainable, at least at present, and so definitive
computations are not possible. Our assessment, however, is that the effects of such small-scale variations on the torques
over the boundaries of the fluid core are unlikely to be large and that their impact on our conclusions is likely to be not
significant.
Received 27
November
2003;
accepted 21
October
2004;
published 5
February
2005.
Citation: Mathews, P. M., and J. Y. Guo
(2005),
Viscoelectromagnetic coupling in precession-nutation theory,
J. Geophys. Res.,
110,
B02402,
doi:10.1029/2003JB002915.