Article ID Journal Published Year Pages File Type
1769408 Advances in Space Research 2006 5 Pages PDF
Abstract
Electric currents across the magnetic field can occur in the solar atmosphere because of quasi-stationary magnetic shear, plasma non-uniformity, or MHD waves. We propose a new physical mechanism that can cause the anomalous dissipation of these currents and initiate energy release in solar plasmas. In the framework of linear kinetic theory, we show that the cross-field currents are unstable with respect to low-frequency perturbations. The instability growth rate is quite high, about 2% of the ion-cyclotron frequency when the differential electron/ion velocity is 0.2 of the ion thermal speed. We identify the unstable perturbations as degenerated ion-acoustic modes coupled with backward kinetic Alfvén modes.
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering Earth and Planetary Sciences Space and Planetary Science
Authors
, , ,