Turbulence Driving by Interstellar Pickup Ions in the Outer Solar Wind

Abstract

We revisit the question of how the unstable scattering of interstellar pickup ions (PUIs) may drive turbulence in the outer solar wind, and why the energy released into fluctuations by this scattering appears to be significantly less than the standard bispherical prediction. We suggest that energization of the newly picked-up ions by the ambient turbulence during the scattering process can result in a more spherical distribution of PUIs, and reduce the generated fluctuation energy to a level consistent with the observations of turbulent intensities and core solar wind heating. This scenario implies the operation of a self-regulation mechanism that maintains the observed conditions of turbulence and heating in the PUI-dominated solar wind.

To be published in The Astrophysical Journal

References in corpus (5)

• The Solar Wind Around Pluto (SWAP) Instrument Aboard New Horizons
• Interstellar Pickup Ion Observations to 38 AU
• A generalized two-component model of solar wind turbulence and ab initio diffusion mean free paths and drift lengthscales of cosmic rays
• Kolmogorov versus Iroshnikov-Kraichnan spectra: Consequences for ion heating in the solar wind
• Proton heating by pick-up ion driven cyclotron waves in the outer heliosphere: Hybrid expanding box simulations