Electron-Driven Instabilities in the Solar Wind

0560482 - ASÚ 2023 RIV CH eng J - Journal Article
Verscharen, D. - Chandran, B. D. G. - Boella, E. - Halekas, J. - Innocenti, M. E. - Jagarlamudi, V.K. - Micera, A. - Pierrard, V. - Štverák, Štěpán - Vasko, I. Y. - Velli, M. - Whittlesey, P.L.
Electron-Driven Instabilities in the Solar Wind.
Frontiers in Astronomy and Space Sciences. Roč. 9, August (2022), č. článku 951628. E-ISSN 2296-987X
Institutional support: RVO:67985815
Keywords : solar wind * plasma * instabilities
OECD category: Astronomy (including astrophysics,space science)
Impact factor: 3, year: 2022
Method of publishing: Open access

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 Alfven 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.
Permanent Link: https://hdl.handle.net/11104/0334212