Linear and Non-Linear Landau Resonance of Kinetic Alfvén Waves: Consequences for Electron Distribution and Wave Spectrum in the Solar Wind

Abstract

Kinetic Alfven wave turbulence in solar wind is considered and it is shown that non-Maxwellian electron distribution function has a significant effect on the dynamics of the solar wind plasmas. Linear Landau damping leads to the formation of a plateau in the parallel electron distribution function which diminishes the Landau damping rate significantly. Nonlinear scattering of waves by plasma particles is generalized to short wavelengths and it is found that for the solar wind parameters this scattering is the dominant process as compared to three wave decay and coalescence in the wave vector range . Incorporation of these effects lead to the steepening of the wave spectrum between the inertial and the dissipation ranges with a spectral index between 2 and 3. This region can be labeled as the scattering range. Such steepening has been observed in the solar wind plasmas.

The following article has been submitted to Phys. Plasma

Cited by in corpus (17)

• Solar Wind Turbulence and the Role of Ion Instabilities
• Gyrokinetic Simulations of Solar Wind Turbulence from Ion to Electron Scales
• Spectrum of Kinetic Alfven Turbulence
• Enhanced Magnetic Compressibility and Isotropic Scale-Invariance at Sub-Ion Larmor Scales in Solar Wind Turbulence
• Density Fluctuation Spectrum of Solar Wind Turbulence between Ion and Electron Scales
• A Weakened Cascade Model for Turbulence in Astrophysical Plasmas
• Co-existence of Whistler Waves with Kinetic Alfven Wave Turbulence for the High-beta Solar Wind Plasma
• The Origin of Non-Maxwellian Solar Wind Electron Velocity Distribution Function: Connection to Nanoflares in the Solar Corona
• Kinetic Alfvén turbulence below and above ion-cyclotron frequency
• Turbulent spectra and spectral kinks in the transition range from MHD to kinetic Alfvén turbulence
• Vlasov simulations of Kinetic Alfvén Waves at proton kinetic scales
• Spectrum of kinetic plasma turbulence at 0.3-0.9 astronomical units from the Sun
• Weak turbulence theory of the non-linear evolution of the ion ring distribution
• Entanglement of helicity and energy in kinetic Alfven wave/whistler turbulence
• Velocity-Space Proton Diffusion in the Solar Wind Turbulence
• Quasilinear Evolution of Kinetic Alfven Wave Turbulence and Perpendicular Ion Heating in the Solar Wind
• Kappa-Maxwellian electrons and Bi-Maxwellian protons in a two-fluid model for fast solar wind