On Large-Scale Dynamo Action at High Magnetic Reynolds Number

We consider the generation of magnetic activity — dynamo waves — in the astrophysical limit of very large magnetic Reynolds number. We consider kinematic dynamo action for a system consisting of helical flow and large-scale shear. We demonstrate that large-scale dynamo waves persist at high $Rm$ if the helical flow is characterised by a narrow band of spatial scales and the shear is large enough. However for a wide band of scales the dynamo becomes small-scale with a further increase of $Rm$, with dynamo waves re-emerging only if the shear is then increased. We show that at high $Rm$ the key effect of the shear is to suppress small-scale dynamo action, allowing large-scale dynamo action to be observed. We conjecture that this supports a general “suppression principle” — large-scale dynamo action can only be observed if there is a mechanism that suppresses the small-scale fluctuations.