New aspects of electrostatic streaming instability

The electrostatic streaming instability is one of the most fundamental processes in the solar-terrestrial plasma environment as reported in numerous observations and has been studied by many authors based on particle-in-cell simulations. For example, bi-streaming and bump-on-tail instabilities have been shown as the possible generation mechanisms of electrostatic solitary waves occurring in the magnetosphere and solar wind. In this study the comparison between linear fluid theory and the results from particle-in-cell simulations is carried out to address the fluid aspects and thermodynamics of electrostatic streaming instability. The growth rates and threshold conditions of streaming instabilities from nonlinear simulations are found to be in good agreement with the linear theory and the thermodynamics is inferred from nonlinear calculations.