Table 1.

Scaling between the laboratory system and a typical intermediate polar.

Parameter	Lab	Astro
Plasma βram	1	$\lesssim 1$
Magnetic Reynolds number, Rm	10	≫ 1
Fluid Reynolds number, R	105	106
Mach number, M	2	>10
Cooling time, tcool	3–4 ns	~1 s
Cooling parameter, χ	0.5	≪1
Shock standoff distance, hs,	0.8 ± 0.1 mm	~1000 km

The cooling parameter is defined as the ratio of the cooling time to the characteristic hydrodynamical timescale χ = t_cool/t_hyd and is a measure of the importance of radiative effects. Values for the astrophysical system are taken from^13,27.