Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath
Abstract The Earth's magnetosheath (MSH) is governed by numerous physical processes which shape the particle velocity distributions and contribute to the heating of the plasma. Among them are whistler waves which can interact with electrons. We investigate whistler waves detected in the quasi‐p...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Wiley
2022-08-01
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| Series: | Geophysical Research Letters |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL099065 |
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| author | I. Svenningsson E. Yordanova G. Cozzani Yu. V. Khotyaintsev M. André |
| author_facet | I. Svenningsson E. Yordanova G. Cozzani Yu. V. Khotyaintsev M. André |
| author_sort | I. Svenningsson |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract The Earth's magnetosheath (MSH) is governed by numerous physical processes which shape the particle velocity distributions and contribute to the heating of the plasma. Among them are whistler waves which can interact with electrons. We investigate whistler waves detected in the quasi‐parallel MSH by NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale mission. We find that the whistler waves occur even in regions that are predicted stable to wave growth by electron temperature anisotropy. Whistlers are observed in ion‐scale magnetic minima and are associated with electrons having butterfly‐shaped pitch‐angle distributions. We investigate in detail one example and, with the support of modeling by the linear numerical dispersion solver Waves in Homogeneous, Anisotropic, Multicomponent Plasmas, we demonstrate that the butterfly distribution is unstable to the observed whistler waves. We conclude that the observed waves are generated locally. The result emphasizes the importance of considering complete 3D particle distribution functions, and not only the temperature anisotropy, when studying plasma wave instabilities. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-486576794e2a4bb68c4d791977e7b387 |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 0094-8276 1944-8007 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2022-08-01 |
| publisher | Wiley |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Geophysical Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj-art-486576794e2a4bb68c4d791977e7b3872025-08-20T02:27:43ZengWileyGeophysical Research Letters0094-82761944-80072022-08-014915n/an/a10.1029/2022GL099065Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent MagnetosheathI. Svenningsson0E. Yordanova1G. Cozzani2Yu. V. Khotyaintsev3M. André4Swedish Institute of Space Physics Uppsala SwedenSwedish Institute of Space Physics Uppsala SwedenDepartment of Physics University of Helsinki Helsinki FinlandSwedish Institute of Space Physics Uppsala SwedenSwedish Institute of Space Physics Uppsala SwedenAbstract The Earth's magnetosheath (MSH) is governed by numerous physical processes which shape the particle velocity distributions and contribute to the heating of the plasma. Among them are whistler waves which can interact with electrons. We investigate whistler waves detected in the quasi‐parallel MSH by NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale mission. We find that the whistler waves occur even in regions that are predicted stable to wave growth by electron temperature anisotropy. Whistlers are observed in ion‐scale magnetic minima and are associated with electrons having butterfly‐shaped pitch‐angle distributions. We investigate in detail one example and, with the support of modeling by the linear numerical dispersion solver Waves in Homogeneous, Anisotropic, Multicomponent Plasmas, we demonstrate that the butterfly distribution is unstable to the observed whistler waves. We conclude that the observed waves are generated locally. The result emphasizes the importance of considering complete 3D particle distribution functions, and not only the temperature anisotropy, when studying plasma wave instabilities.https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL099065quasi‐parallel magnetosheathwhistler waveselectron butterfly distribution |
| spellingShingle | I. Svenningsson E. Yordanova G. Cozzani Yu. V. Khotyaintsev M. André Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath Geophysical Research Letters quasi‐parallel magnetosheath whistler waves electron butterfly distribution |
| title | Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath |
| title_full | Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath |
| title_fullStr | Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath |
| title_full_unstemmed | Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath |
| title_short | Kinetic Generation of Whistler Waves in the Turbulent Magnetosheath |
| title_sort | kinetic generation of whistler waves in the turbulent magnetosheath |
| topic | quasi‐parallel magnetosheath whistler waves electron butterfly distribution |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL099065 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT isvenningsson kineticgenerationofwhistlerwavesintheturbulentmagnetosheath AT eyordanova kineticgenerationofwhistlerwavesintheturbulentmagnetosheath AT gcozzani kineticgenerationofwhistlerwavesintheturbulentmagnetosheath AT yuvkhotyaintsev kineticgenerationofwhistlerwavesintheturbulentmagnetosheath AT mandre kineticgenerationofwhistlerwavesintheturbulentmagnetosheath |