Electron mirror instability: Particle-in-cell simulations

Abstract

Properties of the electron mirror instability and its competition with the usually dominant whistler (electron cyclotron) instability driven by the electron perpendicular temperature anisotropy are investigated on the linear level using a Vlasov linear solver and on the nonlinear level using a two-dimensional full particle code. The simulation results show that the linearly subdominant electron mirror instability may compete on the nonlinear level with the whistler instability and may even become eventually the dominant mode that generates robust non-propagating sub-ion-scale coherent structures in the form of magnetic peaks.

arXiv comment12 pages, 7 figures, J. Plasma Phys

References in corpus (10)

• Firehose and Mirror Instabilities in a Collisionless Shearing Plasma
• PIC Simulations of Continuously Driven Mirror and Ion Cyclotron Instabilities in High Beta Astrophysical and Heliospheric Plasmas
• Observations of kinetic-size magnetic holes in the magnetosheath
• The Electron Temperature and Anisotropy in the Solar Wind. I. Comparison of the Core and Halo Populations
• Electron Heating by the Ion Cyclotron Instability in Collisionless Accretion Flows. I. Compression-Driven Instabilities and the Electron Heating Mechanism
• Suppression of electron thermal conduction by whistler turbulence in a sustained thermal gradient
• Suppression of thermal conduction in a mirror-unstable plasma
• Mirror instability in the turbulent solar wind
• Proton fire hose instabilities in the expanding solar wind
• Nonlinear theory of mirror instability near threshold

Cited by in corpus (5)

• Three-dimensional magnetic reconnection in particle-in-cell simulations of anisotropic plasma turbulence
• Electron Temperature Anisotropy and Electron Beam Constraints From Electron Kinetic Instabilities in the Solar Wind
• Bridging hybrid- and full-kinetic models with Landau-fluid electrons: I. 2D magnetic reconnection
• Microinstabilities in the Transition Region of Weak Quasi-Perpendicular Intracluster Shocks
• Triggering tearing in a forming current sheet with the mirror instability