Physics – Plasma Physics
Scientific paper
Dec 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009agufmsh31a1455p&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2009, abstract #SH31A-1455
Physics
Plasma Physics
[7845] Space Plasma Physics / Particle Acceleration, [7851] Space Plasma Physics / Shock Waves
Scientific paper
The ability to accurately predict the absolute intensity of shock accelerated particles requires a quantitative model of the shock acceleration injection process. While a shock wave heats the plasma it passes through and routinely accelerates a small fraction of ambient particles; the average particle that interacts with a non-parallel, fast-mode shock loses kinetic energy. This particle energy loss is required to balances the increase in the Poynting flux across the shock. That is, in the rest frame of non-parallel, magnetosonic, fast-mode shock conservation of energy and Poynting’s theorem leads to: 1) the average charged particle interacting with the shock losing kinetic energy; and 2) that this energy loss coming from contributing to shock front current sheet and being displaced in the rest frame V x B electric field. In the case of nearly perpendicular shocks, in order for electrons to gain energy in the V x B electric field, their grad B drift speed must by greater than their current sheet drift speed, which is in the opposite direction. The electron current sheet drift is an En x B drift, where En is the charge-separation electric field in the shock front which points upstream. Using these criteria, we show that electron shock acceleration injection should only occur when an electron’s pre-shock perpendicular energy is greater than the electrostatic potential drop across the shock divided by (the shock strength minus one). We use this injection criterion with diffusive shock acceleration theory to calculate the post shock, absolute electron spectra for a range of shock Mach numbers and ambient electron populations.
Brecht Stephen H.
Pesses Mark E.
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