MHD Turbulence in an Accretion Disk

A long-standing problem in the theory of astrophysical accretion disks has been to determine the nature of the stress that transports orbital angular momentum outward. The discovery of a local MHD instability is strong evidence that transport occurs through turbulent Maxwell and Reynolds stresses. Using numerical simulations, we have demonstrated that a weak seed magnetic field in an accretion disk shear flow is unstable and leads to sustained MHD turbulence at dynamically important levels.