Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2007/iii/paper-65/3/b/solution

On one poloidal flux surface, the field-line angular velocity is constant. In a frame rotating at that rate the relative velocity is , parallel to the magnetic field. The Lorentz force is perpendicular to this motion, and the Coriolis force also does no work. Centrifugal acceleration comes from the effective potential . Since entropy is constant along the surface, pressure work integrates to specific enthalpy , with along the flow.
Therefore kinetic energy relative to the rotating poloidal flux surface, enthalpy and effective gravitational-plus-centrifugal potential have a constant sum:
This is a corotating energy integral, not the laboratory energy alone: Maxwell stress tensor stresses can transfer energy and angular momentum in the laboratory frame. In fact the expression equals , namely the total magnetohydrodynamic Bernoulli invariant minus . Differential rotation between surfaces does not invalidate the argument, because the chosen angular velocity is fixed along the particular surface being followed.

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