Magnetic Rayleigh–Taylor Instability in an Experiment Simulating a Solar Loop

Abstract

A hoop force driven magnetic Rayleigh–Taylor instability (MRTI) is observed in a laboratory experiment that simulates a solar coronal loop. Increase of the axial wavelength λ is observed when the axial magnetic field increases. This scaling is consistent with the theoretical MRTI growth rate , which implies that if is parallel to (i.e., undular mode), the fastest-growing mode has .