Waves in space plasmas - The mirror trapping of hot auroral electronsA brief review is given of the problem of precipitation of auroral electrons by electrostatic Bernstein waves. Since the magnetospheric loss cone is small, only moderately small intense levels of wave turbulence are required to remove any large anisotropy sources of free energy and to maintain a weakly anisotropic electron distribution on strong diffusion precipitation. The electrostatic electron cyclotron harmonic waves are nonconvectively unstable for weak loss cone anisotropies and over a large range of parameters for both the hot and cold distributions. Since the instability is nonconvective, weak wave growth can be maintained independent of the flux level of the hot electrons, i.e., the instability does not have the stably trapped flux limit imposed by convective amplification. Recent plasma numerical simulations show that the nonlinear evolution of this instability involves both the pitch angle diffusion of the hot electrons and the heating of the cold electrons.
Document ID
19810047554
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Proceedings
Authors
Ashour-Abdalla, M. (California Univ. Los Angeles, CA, United States)
Coroniti, F. V. (California Univ. Los Angeles, CA, United States)
Kennel, C. F. (California, University Los Angeles, Calif., United States)
Date Acquired
August 11, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 1980
Subject Category
Geophysics
Meeting Information
Meeting: International Conference on Plasma Physics