Energetic neutral atoms

Physics

Scientific paper

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Energetic Neutral Atoms, Heliosphere

Scientific paper

The use of energetic neutral atoms (ENAs), produced by charge exchange between energetic ions and ambient neutral atoms, as a means to image energetic ions in space plasmas has been extended to the investigation of the heliosphere. We explore what can be expected and what is observed of heliospheric ENAs in quiet time interplanetary space. Modeling shows that energetic hydrogen atoms have distinctive signatures and the detection of these particles reveals the spatial and possibly temporal distribution of the parent protons in the outer heliosphere. Being neutral, ENAs are unaffected by magnetic fields and solar modulation, so each ENA preserves the direction of flight at its birth, moving to distant regions unreachable by the original population of ions. Furthermore, since there is insignificant energy transfer in the charge-exchange, ENA preserves the energy of the ion prior to the interaction. Thus ENAs are samples of remote space plasmas often inaccessible to in situ observations. The further observation of ENAs allows to substantiate the predictions of the models and simulations describing the plasma and neutral gas physical states and distributions in the inner and outer heliosphere.

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