Nonaxisymmetric linear instability of cylindrical magnetohydrodynamic Taylor-Couette flow

We consider the nonaxisymmetric modes of instability present in Taylor-Couette flow under the application of helical magnetic fields, mainly for magnetic Prandtl numbers close to the inductionless limit, and conduct a full examination of marginal stability in the resulting parameter space. We allow for the azimuthal magnetic field to be generated by a combination of currents in the inner cylinder and fluid itself and introduce a parameter governing the relation between the strength of these currents. A set of governing eigenvalue equations for the nonaxisymmetric modes of instability are derived and solved by spectral collocation with Chebyshev polynomials over the relevant parameter space, with the resulting instabilities examined in detail. We find that by altering the azimuthal magnetic field profiles the azimuthal magnetorotational instability, nonaxisymmetric helical magnetorotational instability, and Tayler instability yield interesting dynamics, such as different preferred mode types and modes with azimuthal wave number m>1. Finally, a comparison is given to the recent WKB analysis performed by Kirillov et al. [Kirillov, Stefani, and Fukumoto, J. Fluid Mech. 760, 591 (2014)JFLSA70022-112010.1017/jfm.2014.614] and its validity in the linear regime.