Particle acceleration by interstellar plasma shock waves in non-uniform background magnetic field

2020 ◽  
Vol 498 (4) ◽  
pp. 5517-5523
Author(s):  
P Rashed-Mohassel ◽  
M Ghorbanalilu
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Particle Acceleration ◽  
Shock Waves ◽  
Electric Field ◽  
Background Field ◽  
Magnetized Plasma ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Positive Variation ◽  
Uniform Background ◽  
Plasma Shock

ABSTRACT Particle acceleration by plasma shock waves is investigated for a magnetized plasma cloud propagating in a non-uniform background magnetic field by means of analytical and numerical calculations. The mechanism studied here is mainly, magnetic trapping acceleration (MTA) which is previously investigated for a cloud moving through the uniform interstellar magnetic field (IMF). In this work, the acceleration is studied for a cloud moving in an antiparallel background field with spatial variations along the direction of motion. For negative variation, the cloud moves towards an antiparallel magnetic field with an increasing intensity, the trapped particle moves to locations with higher convective electric field and therefore gains more energy over time. For positive variation, the background field decreases to zero and changes into a parallel field with an increasing intensity. It is concluded that, when the background field vanishes, the MTA mechanism ceases and the particle escapes into the space. This leads to a bouncing acceleration which further increases energy of the gyrating particle. The two processes are followed by a shock drift acceleration, where due to the background magnetic field gradient, the particle drifts along the electric field and gains energy. Although for positive variation, three different mechanisms are involved, energy gain is less than in the case of a uniform background field.

Magnetic Field

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary A. Glatzmaier
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Dispersion Relation ◽  
Background Field ◽  
Magnetohydrodynamic Equations ◽  
Electrically Conducting ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Nonlinear Simulations ◽  
Uniform Background ◽  
The Stability ◽  
2D Model

This chapter focuses on magnetoconvection, which refers to thermal convection of an electrically conducting fluid within a background magnetic field maintained by some external mechanism. It first provides a brief overview of magnetohydrodynamics and the magnetohydrodynamic equations before explaining how to make a 2D model of magnetic field. In this approach, the case of a uniform vertical background field and the case of a uniform horizontal background field are both considered. The chapter then describes how one could simulate a case of a uniform background field that is tilted relative to both the vertical and horizontal axes. It also considers what can be learned about the stability and structure of magnetoconvection and the dispersion relation for magneto-gravity waves from analytical analyses without the nonlinear terms. Finally, it discusses nonlinear simulations of magnetoconvection in a box with impermeable side boundaries, along with magnetoconvection with a horizontal background field and an arbitrary background field.

Scatter-free acceleration of particles by interaction with plasma shock waves in the interstellar medium

2021 ◽  
Vol 503 (2) ◽  
pp. 2195-2202
Author(s):  
P Rashed-Mohassel ◽  
M Ghorbanalilu
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Shock Waves ◽  
Test Particle ◽  
Magnetic Trapping ◽  
Acceleration Of Particles ◽  
Acceleration Mechanism ◽  
Spiral Path ◽  
Interacting Particle ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Plasma Shock

ABSTRACT Scatter-free acceleration is investigated for a test particle thrusted by a moving magnetized cloud in the presence of the uniform interstellar magnetic field. It is found that depending on the orientation of the background magnetic field, three different scenarios occur for the interacting particle. In some cases, the particle reflects into space with a negligible increase in energy. Otherwise, the particle is either trapped at the wavefront or is injected inside the cloud. The trapped particle moves with the cloud and gains energy through the magnetic trapping acceleration mechanism, which is already investigated in previous reports. The injected particle accelerates through a different mechanism, which is introduced in this paper as the spiral acceleration. In this mechanism, the particle moves in a spiral path and gains energy by the convective electric field of the cloud. The radius of the spiral increases as the particle gains more energy and the process continues until the particle is located inside the cloud. Since in most cases the trapping condition is not satisfied, the spiral acceleration mechanism is of great importance.

Cross-field plasma acceleration and potential formation induced by electromagnetic waves in a magnetized plasma

2001 ◽  
Vol 66 (3) ◽  
pp. 143-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. SUGAYA
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Particle Acceleration ◽  
Electric Field ◽  
Electromagnetic Waves ◽  
Collisionless Plasma ◽  
Magnetized Plasma ◽  
Propagating Waves ◽  
Potential Formation ◽  
Dynamo Effect ◽  
The Magnetic Field

A single-particle theory is developed to investigate particle acceleration along and across a magnetic field and the generation of an electric field transverse to the magnetic field induced by electromagnetic waves in a magnetized plasma. The almost perpendicularly propagating waves accelerate particles via their Landau and cyclotron damping, and the ratio of parallel and perpendicular drift velocities vs∥/vd can be proved to be proportional to k∥/k⊥. Simultaneously, an intense cross-field electric field E0 = B0×vd/c is generated via the dynamo effect owing to perpendicular particle acceleration to satisfy the generalized Ohm’s law. This means that this cross-field particle drift in a collisionless plasma is identical to E×B drift. It is verified that the transport equations obtained are exactly equivalent to those derived from the θ-dependent quasilinear velocity-space diffusion equation obtained from the Vlasov–Maxwell equations.

scholarly journals Background field Landau mode operators for the nucleon

2018 ◽  
Vol 175 ◽  
pp. 05018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Waseem Kamleh ◽  
Ryan Bignell ◽  
Derek B. Leinweber ◽  
Matthias Burkardt
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Correlation Function ◽  
Charged Particle ◽  
Finite Lattice ◽  
Background Field ◽  
Spatial Symmetry ◽  
Preliminary Results ◽  
Mode Effects ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Uniform Background

The introduction of a uniform background magnetic field breaks threedimensional spatial symmetry for a charged particle and introduces Landau mode effects. Standard quark operators are inefficient at isolating the nucleon correlation function at nontrivial field strengths. We introduce novel quark operators constructed from the twodimensional Laplacian eigenmodes that describe a charged particle on a finite lattice. These eigenmode-projected quark operators provide enhanced precision for calculating nucleon energy shifts in a magnetic field. Preliminary results are obtained for the neutron and proton magnetic polarisabilities using these methods.

Cross-field plasma acceleration and potential formation induced by electrostatic waves in a relativistic magnetized plasma

2000 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 109-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. SUGAYA
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Particle Acceleration ◽  
Electric Field ◽  
Transport Equations ◽  
Magnetized Plasma ◽  
Moving Frame ◽  
Electrostatic Waves ◽  
Particle Drift ◽  
Potential Formation ◽  
Dynamo Effect

Relativistic and non-relativistic particle acceleration along and across a magnetic field, and the generation of an electric field transverse to the magnetic field, both induced by almost perpendicularly propagating electrostatic waves in a relativistic magnetized plasma, are investigated theoretically on the basis of relativistic quasilinear transport equations. The electrostatic waves accelerate particles via Landau or cyclotron damping, and the ratio of parallel and perpendicular drift velocities vs||/vd can be proved to be proportional to k||/k⊥. Simultaneously, an intense cross-field electric field E0 = B0 × vd/c is generated via the dynamo effect owing to perpendicular particle drift to satisfy the generalized Ohm's law, which means that this cross-field particle drift is identical to E × B drift. The relativistic quasilinear transport equations for relativistic cross-field particle acceleration are derived by Lorentz transformation of the relativistic quasilinear momentum-space diffusion equation in the moving frame of reference without the electric field and the cross-field particle drift. They can be applied to the investigation of the relativistic perpendicular particle acceleration that may possibly occur in space plasmas.

scholarly journals Relativistic Particle Acceleration in Plerions

1994 ◽  
Vol 142 ◽  
pp. 797-806
Author(s):  
Jonathan Arons ◽  
Marco Tavani
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Particle Acceleration ◽  
Shock Waves ◽  
Shock Front ◽  
Heavy Ions ◽  
Surface Brightness ◽  
Crab Nebula ◽  
Electrons And Positrons ◽  
The Crab Nebula ◽  
The Magnetic Field

AbstractWe discuss recent research on the structure and particle acceleration properties of relativistic shock waves in which the magnetic field is transverse to the flow direction in the upstream medium, and whose composition is either pure electrons and positrons or primarily electrons and positrons with an admixture of heavy ions. Particle-in-cell simulation techniques as well as analytic theory have been used to show that such shocks in pure pair plasmas are fully thermalized—the downstream particle spectra are relativistic Maxwellians at the temperature expected from the jump conditions. On the other hand, shocks containing heavy ions which are a minority constituent by number but which carry most of the energy density in the upstream medium do put ~20% of the flow energy into a nonthermal population of pairs downstream, whose distribution in energy space is N(E) ∝ E−2, where N(E)dE is the number of particles with energy between E and E + dE.The mechanism of thermalization and particle acceleration is found to be synchrotron maser activity in the shock front, stimulated by the quasi-coherent gyration of the whole particle population as the plasma flowing into the shock reflects from the magnetic field in the shock front. The synchrotron maser modes radiated by the heavy ions are absorbed by the pairs at their (relativistic) cyclotron frequencies, allowing the maximum energy achievable by the pairs to be γ±m±c2 = mic2γ1/Zi, where γ1 is the Lorentz factor of the upstream flow and Zi, is the atomic number of the ions. The shock’s spatial structure is shown to contain a series of “overshoots” in the magnetic field, regions where the gyrating heavy ions compress the magnetic field to levels in excess of the eventual downstream value.This shock model is applied to an interpretation of the structure of the inner regions of the Crab Nebula, in particular to the “wisps,” surface brightness enhancements near the pulsar. We argue that these surface brightness enhancements are the regions of magnetic overshoot, which appear brighter because the small Larmor radius pairs are compressed and radiate more efficiently in the regions of more intense magnetic field. This interpretation suggests that the structure of the shock terminating the pulsar’s wind in the Crab Nebula is spatially resolved, and allows one to measure γ1, and a number of other properties of the pulsar’s wind. We also discuss applications of the shock theory to the termination shocks of the winds from rotation-powered pulsars embedded in compact binaries. We show that this model adequately accounts for (and indeed predicted) the recently discovered X-ray flux from PSR 1957+20, and we discuss several other applications to other examples of these systems.Subject headings: acceleration of particles — ISM: individual (Crab Nebula) — relativity — shock waves

scholarly journals Structure of a collisionless pair jet in a magnetized electron–proton plasma: flow-aligned magnetic field

2019 ◽  
Vol 621 ◽  
pp. A142 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. E. Dieckmann ◽  
D. Folini ◽  
I. Hotz ◽  
A. Nordman ◽  
P. Dell’Acqua ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Collisionless Plasma ◽  
Mean Velocity ◽  
Ambient Plasma ◽  
Particle In Cell ◽  
Flow Energy ◽  
Pair Plasma ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Order Of Magnitude ◽  
Uniform Background

Aims. We study the effect a guiding magnetic field has on the formation and structure of a pair jet that propagates through a collisionless electron–proton plasma at rest. Methods. We model with a particle-in-cell (PIC) simulation a pair cloud with a temperature of 400 keV and a mean speed of 0.9c (c - light speed). Pair particles are continuously injected at the boundary. The cloud propagates through a spatially uniform, magnetized, and cool ambient electron–proton plasma at rest. The mean velocity vector of the pair cloud is aligned with the uniform background magnetic field. The pair cloud has a lateral extent of a few ion skin depths. Results. A jet forms in time. Its outer cocoon consists of jet-accelerated ambient plasma and is separated from the inner cocoon by an electromagnetic piston with a thickness that is comparable to the local thermal gyroradius of jet particles. The inner cocoon consists of pair plasma, which lost its directed flow energy while it swept out the background magnetic field and compressed it into the electromagnetic piston. A beam of electrons and positrons moves along the jet spine at its initial speed. Its electrons are slowed down and some positrons are accelerated as they cross the head of the jet. The latter escape upstream along the magnetic field, which yields an excess of megaelectronvolt positrons ahead of the jet. A filamentation instability between positrons and protons accelerates some of the protons, which were located behind the electromagnetic piston at the time it formed, to megaelectronvolt energies. Conclusions. A microscopic pair jet in collisionless plasma has a structure that is similar to that predicted by a hydrodynamic model of relativistic astrophysical pair jets. It is a source of megaelectronvolt positrons. An electromagnetic piston acts as the contact discontinuity between the inner and outer cocoons. It would form on subsecond timescales in a plasma with a density that is comparable to that of the interstellar medium in the rest frame of the latter. A supercritical fast magnetosonic shock will form between the pristine ambient plasma and the jet-accelerated plasma on a timescale that exceeds our simulation time by an order of magnitude.

scholarly journals Europa's Alfvén wing: shrinkage and displacement influenced by an induced magnetic field

2007 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 905-914 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Volwerk ◽  
K. Khurana ◽  
M. Kivelson
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Plasma Density ◽  
Geometric Modeling ◽  
Numerical Models ◽  
Background Field ◽  
Entry And Exit ◽  
Induced Magnetic Field ◽  
Background Magnetic Field ◽  
Magnetometer Data ◽  
Induced Field

Abstract. The Galileo magnetometer data are used to investigate the structure of the Alfvén wing during three flybys of Europa. The presence of an induced magnetic field is shown to shrink the cross section of the Alfvén wing and offset it along the direction radial to Jupiter. Both the shrinkage and the offset depend on the strength of the induced field. The entry and exit points of the spacecraft into and out of the Alfvén wings are modeled to determine the angle between the wings and the background magnetic field. Tracing of the Alfvén characteristics in a model magnetic field consisting of Jupiter's background field and an induced field in Europa produces an offset and shrinking of the Alfvén wing consistent with the geometric modeling. Thus we believe that the Alfvén wing properties have been determined correctly. The Alfvén wing angle is directly proportional to the local Alfvén velocity, and is thus a probe for the local plasma density. We show that the inferred plasma density can be understood in terms of the electron density measured by the plasma wave experiment. When Europa is located in the Jovian plasma sheet the derived mass-per-charge exceeds the previous estimates, which is a result of increased pickup of sputtered ions near the moon. The estimated rate of O2+ pickup agrees well with the results from numerical models.

Magnetic structure of ionizing shock waves Part 3. Normal shocks

1972 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 177-185 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. P. Leonard
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Field ◽  
Shock Waves ◽  
Electric Field ◽  
Field Component ◽  
Magnetic Energy ◽  
Transverse Field ◽  
Transverse Magnetic ◽  
En Numbers ◽  
Magnetic Field Magnitude ◽  
Oblique Shocks

Normal ionizing shock waves are considered as a subclass of oblique shocks in which the upstream transverse magnetic field component is zero; i.e. the upstream field is normal to the plane of the shock. Non-trivial (switch-on) normal shocks involve a non-zero downstream transverse field component; magnetically trivial normal shocks are simply gas shocks with an imbedded constant normal magnetic field. As with oblique shocks, switch-on normal ionizing shock waves are plane- polarized, provided the conductivity is a scalar. Ohmic structures are discussed for several values of shock Alfv én number, treating the electric field as a free parameter, as usual. For Alfv én numbers extending from zero to two (for the infinite-Mach-number case), there is always a finite range of E field values. Above two, only the gas shock exists, and this requires a unique electric field value. Because the magnetic field magnitude increases through switch-on shocks, there is no mechanism available for converting magnetic energy into thermal energy, as is the case for oblique or skew shocks. Thus, there is no significant downstream heating above the viscous temperature; and, in some cases, slight downstream cooling may even occur. Expansion shocks are not possible in this geometry. Previous studies are reviewed in the light of structural requirements, and some erroneous results are clarified; in particular, it should be noted that MHD switchon solutions for the pre-ionized case are not imbedded in the family of ionizing switch-on solutions.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document