  We have employed a 3-d energy-conserving radiation MHD code to simulate the
vertical structure and thermodynamics of a shearing box whose parameters were
chosen so that the radiation and gas pressures would be comparable. The upper
layers of this disk segment are magnetically-dominated, creating conditions
appropriate for both photon bubble and Parker instabilities. We find little
evidence for photon bubbles, even though the simulation has enough spatial
resolution to see them and their predicted growth rates are high. On the other
hand, there is strong evidence for Parker instabilities, and they appear to
dominate the evolution of the magnetically supported surface layers. The disk
photosphere is complex, with large density inhomogeneities at both the
scattering and effective (thermalization) photospheres of the evolving
horizontally-averaged structure. Both the dominant magnetic support and the
inhomogeneities are likely to have strong effects on the spectrum and
polarization of thermal photons emerging from the disk atmosphere. The
inhomogeneities are also large enough to affect models of reflection spectra
from the atmospheres of accretion disks.
