Physics – Plasma Physics
Scientific paper
Dec 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009agufmsm42b..07c&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2009, abstract #SM42B-07
Physics
Plasma Physics
[2764] Magnetospheric Physics / Plasma Sheet, [7829] Space Plasma Physics / Kinetic Waves And Instabilities, [7863] Space Plasma Physics / Turbulence
Scientific paper
The center of the plasma sheet is characterized by the nearly continuous presence of large fluctuations in the flow velocity and in the magnetic field with timescales of a few minutes. Typically, the flow fluctuations are much larger than the mean flows, and the magnetic field fluctuations are comparable to the mean field magnitudes. 3D PIC simulations are used to demonstrate that a plasma sheet equilibrium with a minimum in the magnetic normal (Bz) component is unstable to a ballooning/interchange mode that is localized tailward of the minimum in the positive gradient region of Bz where the electrons are adiabatic. The mode has a relatively short dawn-dusk wavelength of the order of the ion Larmor radius in the Bz field ( ˜2000 km) and a phase velocity in the direction of the ion diamagnetic drift with a magnitude about one-fifth of the drift speed. The real frequency is about 60% of the mid-plane ion cyclotron frequency. The dominant mode polarization is δ φ and δ B||. A linear kinetic analysis including bounce and drift resonance interactions for the electrons and an orbit average over the flux tube volume for the Boltzmann term in the ion density perturbation produces agreement with the simulation mode properties and permits identification of the mode as the low frequency extension of the lower hybrid drift instability in straight magnetic geometry. This analysis suggests that for the magnetically curved geometry of the plasma sheet both ion and electron kinetic effects are important for accurately describing plasma sheet turbulence. Simply stated, the plasma sheet is not a fluid medium, not even for the electrons.
Coroniti Ferdinan V.
Pritchett Philip L.
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