Verscharen, Daniel;
Chandran, Benjamin DG;
Boella, Elisabetta;
Halekas, Jasper;
Innocenti, Maria Elena;
Jagarlamudi, Vamsee K;
Micera, Alfredo;
... Whittlesey, Phyllis L; + view all
(2022)
Electron-driven instabilities in the solar wind.
Frontiers in Astronomy and Space Sciences
10.3389/fspas.2022.951628.
(In press).
Preview |
Text
Verscharen_Electron-driven instabilities in the solar wind_AAM.pdf Download (1MB) | Preview |
Abstract
The electrons are an essential particle species in the solar wind. They often exhibit non-equilibrium features in their velocity distribution function. These include temperature anisotropies, tails (kurtosis), and reflectional asymmetries (skewness), which contribute a significant heat flux to the solar wind. If these non-equilibrium features are sufficiently strong, they drive kinetic micro-instabilities. We develop a semi-graphical framework based on the equations of quasi-linear theory to describe electron-driven instabilities in the solar wind. We apply our framework to resonant instabilities driven by temperature anisotropies. These include the electron whistler anisotropy instability and the propagating electron firehose instability. We then describe resonant instabilities driven by reflectional asymmetries in the electron distribution function. These include the electron/ion-acoustic, kinetic Alfv\'en heat-flux, Langmuir, electron-beam, electron/ion-cyclotron, electron/electron-acoustic, whistler heat-flux, oblique fast-magnetosonic/whistler, lower-hybrid fan, and electron-deficit whistler instability. We briefly comment on non-resonant instabilities driven by electron temperature anisotropies such as the mirror-mode and the non-propagating firehose instability. We conclude our review with a list of open research topics in the field of electron-driven instabilities in the solar wind.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Electron-driven instabilities in the solar wind |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.3389/fspas.2022.951628 |
| Publisher version: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspas... |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2022 Verscharen, Chandran, Boella, Halekas, Innocenti, Jagarlamudi, Micera, Pierrard, Stverak, Vasko, Velli and Whittlesey. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
| Keywords: | Solar wind, Plasma, instabilities, Electrons, temperature anisotropy, heat flux, Quasi-linear theory |
| UCL classification: | UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Space and Climate Physics UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10152164 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
