On the Generation of Rotational Discontinuities in the Solar Wind

Details On the Generation of Rotational Discontinuities in the Solar Wind On the Generation of Rotational Discontinuities in the Solar Wind

Dec 2004

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2004agufmsh31a1166l&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2004, abstract #SH31A-1166

Physics

7811 Discontinuities, 7843 Numerical Simulation Studies, 2109 Discontinuities, 2134 Interplanetary Magnetic Fields, 2149 Mhd Waves And Turbulence

Scientific paper

Magnetic hodogram of rotational discontinuities (RDs) observed in the solar wind are characterized by mixed magnetic polarity (Neugebauer, 1989). This type of magnetic hodogram is part of the nonlinear wave solutions obtained in our previous theoretical study. Unfortunately, previous simulation studies fail to reproduce this type of RDs from a circularized nonlinear Alfven wave. Our recent MHD simulation study of velocity-shear instability indicates that no vortex but nonlinear plane waves can be formed if the velocity shear is greater than twice of the fast-mode speed. Phase-steepened nonlinear Alfven waves with mixed magnetic polarity can be found on both sides of the velocity-shear layer. Wave normal of these nonlinear Alfven waves is nearly anti-sunward in the slow solar wind region but sunward in the fast solar wind region. Our hybrid simulation study shows that RDs with mixed magnetic polarity can be developed from this type of nonlinear Alfven waves. Thus, we propose that RDs can be generated by velocity-shear instability in the solar wind. Comparison between our simulation results and previous solar-wind observations of RDs (Neugebauer, 1989) and nonlinear Alfven waves (Mavromichalaki et al., 1988) will be discussed.

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