ULYSSES observations of electron and proton components in a magnetic cloud and related wave activity
Abstract
In addition to a smooth rotation of the magnetic field vector, magnetic clouds have a low proton temperature Tp. Their expansion in the solar wind leads to depletion and therefore the ion component cools down. It has been shown recently that the electron component in magnetic clouds behaves differently: when the cloud expands, electron temperature Te anti correlates with density and therefore Te increases in the cloud, creating favorable conditions for the rise of ion-acoustic waves. For the magnetic cloud observed by Ulysses on June 10 - 12, 1993 at 4.64 AU at S 32.5 deg, we present observations for both electron and proton components and related plasma wave activity. Our results confirm the anti correlation between Te and electron density and also exhibit a high ratio of Te/TP in the cloud. Since Landau damping is not effective for Te/Tp much greater than 1, Doppler shifted ion acoustic waves are expected in the cloud. Calculation of ion acoustic wave frequencies in the cloud and comparison with observed wave activity confirm this expectation. As in our previous work, we show that the electron component in the cloud obeys a polytropic law with gamma is less than 1 (gamma approximately equals 0.3-0.4). The dynamics of the magnetic cloud are determined to a large degree by the dominating electron pressure.
- Publication:
-
Solar Wind Eight
- Pub Date:
- June 1995
- Bibcode:
- 1995sowi.conf..100O
- Keywords:
-
- Magnetic Clouds;
- Protons;
- Electrons;
- Ulysses Mission;
- Electron Pressure;
- Ion Acoustic Waves;
- Solar Wind;
- Electron Density (Concentration);
- Electron Energy;
- Magnetic Fields;
- Cooling;
- Landau Damping;
- Astrophysics