Taylor, Tayler, Velikhov: Tailored experiments on the interaction of rotating fluids and magnetic fields

The interaction of rotating fluids and magnetic fields is of crucial interest for the explanation of many astrophysical phenomena. The magnetorotational instability (MRI), discovered by Velikhov in 1959 when studying a magnetized Couette-Taylor flow, is presently considered the most likely mechanism for triggering turbulence and angular momentum transport in accretion disks. The Tayler instability (TI), a kink-type current-driven instability, may play an important role in angular momentum and chemical species transport in stars, and is also discussed as a possible ingredient of an alternative stellar dynamo mechanism.
The last years have seen significant progress in the experimental investigation of both instabilities. We summarize the recent results, obtained in various liquid metal experiments, on the helical and azimuthal versions of MRI, and on the TI. The prospects of studying both instabilities, MRI and
TI, in a combined large scale liquid sodium experiment are discussed in the context of theoretical predictions.