Simulations of dynamo action in slowly rotating M dwarfs: Dependence on dimensionless parameters

C. A. Ortiz-Rodríguez, P. J. Käpylä, F. H. Navarrete, D. R. G Schleicher, R. E. Mennickent, J. P. Hidalgo, B. Toro

Published 2023-05-25Version 1

The aim of this study is to explore the magnetic and flow properties of fully convective M dwarfs as a function of rotation period Prot and magnetic Reynolds ReM and Prandlt numbers PrM. We performed three-dimensional simulations of fully convective stars using a star-in-a-box setup. This setup allows global dynamo simulations in a sphere embedded in a Cartesian cube. The equations of non-ideal magnetohydrodynamics were solved with the Pencil Code. We used the stellar parameters of an M5 dwarf with 0.21M_odot at three rotation rates corresponding to rotation periods (Prot): 43, 61 and 90 days, and varied the magnetic Prandtl number in the range from 0.1 to 10. We found systematic differences in the behaviour of the large-scale magnetic field as functions of rotation and PrM. For the simulations with Prot = 43 days and PrM <= 2, we found cyclic large-scale magnetic fields. For PrM > 2 the cycles vanish and field shows irregular reversals. In simulations with Prot = 61 days for PrM <= 2 the cycles are less clear and the reversal are less periodic. In the higher-PrM cases, the axisymmetric mean field shows irregular variations. For the slowest rotation case with Prot = 90 days, the field has an important dipolar component for PrM <= 5. For the highest PrM the large-scale magnetic field is predominantly irregular at mid-latitudes, with quasi-stationary fields near the poles. For the simulations with cycles, the cycle period length slightly increases with increasing ReM.