Physics
Scientific paper
May 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009agusmsh24a..06z&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2009, abstract #SH24A-06
Physics
2124 Heliopause And Solar Wind Termination, 2126 Heliosphere/Interstellar Medium Interactions, 2151 Neutral Particles (7837), 2152 Pickup Ions
Scientific paper
Observations by the Voyager 2 spacecraft of the structure of the heliospheric termination shock revealed a quasi-perpendicular structure that possessed many of the characteristics that are familiar to us from perpendicular shocks observed in the inner heliosphere. However, a surprise was the relative lack of heating experienced by thermal solar wind ions (and electrons), leading to the suggestion that the pickup ions were primarily heated at the heliospheric termination shock. Because the Voyager plasma instrument cannot measure the interstellar pickup ions directly, their behavior at the termination shock could not be gauged directly. Nonetheless, it had already been predicted by Zank et al. 1996 that the primary dissipation mechanism for the quasi-perpendicular termination shock would be the reflection of pickup ions rather than solar wind ions; this because of the shell-like structure of the pickup ion distribution function. We discuss the effect of pickup ions including their trajectories within the structure of the shock observed by Voyager 2. A model for the shock structure is constructed on the basis of preferentially reflected pickup ions, and some solutions are discussed. We estimate the degree of heating for the various components and discuss how this will influence the character of the energetic neutral atoms created in the inner heliosheath.
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