Parametric Decay Instability and Dissipation of Low-frequency Alfvén Waves in Low-beta Turbulent Plasmas

Abstract

Evolution of the parametric decay instability (PDI) of a circularly polarized Aflvén wave in a turbulent low-beta plasma background is investigated using 3D hybrid simulations. It is shown that the turbulence reduces the growth rate of PDI as compared to the linear theory predictions, but PDI can still exist. Interestingly, the damping rate of ion acoustic mode (as the product of PDI) is also reduced as compared to the linear Vlasov predictions. Nonetheless, significant heating of ions in the direction parallel to the background magnetic field is observed due to resonant Landau damping of the ion acoustic waves. In low-beta turbulent plasmas, PDI can provide an important channel for energy dissipation of low-frequency Alfvén waves at a scale much larger than the ion kinetic scales, different from the traditional turbulence dissipation models.

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Cited by in corpus (10)

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• Nature and Scalings of Density Fluctuations of Compressible MHD Turbulence with Applications to the Solar Wind
• Inverse cascade and magnetic vortices in kinetic Alfvén-wave turbulence
• Evidence for Parameteric Decay Instability in the Lower Solar Atmosphere
• Heating of Heavy Ions in Low-beta Compressible Turbulence
• Compressible Turbulence in the Near-Sun Solar Wind: Parker Solar Probe's First Eight Perihelia
• Flux-tube-dependent propagation of Alfvén waves in the solar corona
• Hybrid simulation of Alfvén wave parametric decay instability in a laboratory relevant plasma