Interaction of Enceladus's Water Plume with Saturnian Magnetosphere via Hybrid Numerical Simulations

Several close Cassini flybys of the Santurnian moon Enceladus provided direct in situ measurements of neutral water molecules escaping from the surface showing their interaction with the ambient plasma environment. Cassini measurements indicate Enceladus to act as an obstacle to the magnetized Saturnian plasma flow resulting in an effect of field line draping. Ionization of escaping neutrals by way of charge exchange with the ambient plasma produces fresh ions which are picked up by the Saturnian magnetosphere. The Saturnian co-rotating plasma flow therefore slows down and the ambient magnetic field is affected. We study these local plasma interaction of Enceladus and its neutral water plume with the Saturnian magnetosphere by using a full 3D hybrid code numerical simulation. The results of our model are subsequently compared with Cassini observations. Since a complete and accurate description of Enceladus surroundings is still missing, the initialialization of our simulations is based on currently published estimations. However, by use the hybrid code we are able to recover very similar magnetic field signatures as some of those realy observed by Cassini spacecraft.