Physics
Scientific paper
May 1999
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1999angeo..17..604b&link_type=abstract
Annales Geophysicae, vol. 17, Issue 5, pp.604-612
Physics
48
Scientific paper
Observations have shown that, prior to substorm explosions, thin current sheets are formed in the plasma sheet of the Earth's magnetotail. This provokes the question, to what extent current-sheet thinning and substorm onsets are physically, maybe even causally, related. To answer this question, one has to understand the plasma stability of thin current sheets. Kinetic effects must be taken into account since particle scales are reached in the course of tail current-sheet thinning. We present the results of theoretical investigations of the stability of thin current sheets and about the most unstable mode of their decay. Our conclusions are based upon a non-local linear dispersion analysis of a cross-magnetic field instability of Harris-type current sheets. We found that a sausage-mode bulk current instability starts after a sheet has thinned down to the ion inertial length. We also present the results of three-dimensional electromagnetic PIC-code simulations carried out for mass ratios up to Mi / me=64. They verify the linearly predicted properties of the sausage mode decay of thin current sheets in the parameter range of interest.
Büchner Jörg
Kuska J.-P.
No associations
LandOfFree
Sausage mode instability of thin current sheets as a cause of magnetospheric substorms does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.
If you have personal experience with Sausage mode instability of thin current sheets as a cause of magnetospheric substorms, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and Sausage mode instability of thin current sheets as a cause of magnetospheric substorms will most certainly appreciate the feedback.
Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-1123693