Related papers: Clarifying the solar wind heat-flux instabilities
This letter presents the results of an advanced parametrization of the solar wind electron temperature anisotropy and the instabilities resulting from the interplay of the (bi-)Maxwellian core and (bi-)Kappa halo populations in the slow…
Observations show that plasma particles in the solar wind frequently display power-law velocity distributions, which can be isotropic or anisotropic. Particularly, the velocity distribution functions of solar wind electrons are frequently…
Recent statistical studies of observational data unveil relevant correlations between whistler fluctuations and the anisotropic electron populations present in space plasmas, e.g., solar wind and planetary magnetospheres. Locally, whistlers…
We investigate the scattering of strahl electrons by microinstabilities as a mechanism for creating the electron halo in the solar wind. We develop a mathematical framework for the description of electron-driven microinstabilities and…
Despite the fact that electrons observed in situ in space plasmas have three major components-the quasi-thermal core, suprathermal halo, and strahl-the analysis of instabilities triggered by kinetic, velocity-space anisotropies (such as…
There is wide observational evidence that electron velocity distribution functions (eVDF) observed in the solar wind generally present enhanced tails and field-aligned skewness. These properties may induce the excitation of electromagnetic…
The fluid behavior of the solar wind is affected by the heat flux carried by the suprathermal electron populations, especially the electron strahl (or beam) that propagates along the magnetic field. In turn, the electron strahl cannot be…
The evolution of the electron heat flux in the solar wind is regulated by the interplay between several effects: solar wind expansion, that can potentially drive velocity-space instabilties, turbulence and wave-particle interactions, and,…
The selfgenerated wave fluctuations are particularly interesting in the solar wind and magnetospheric plasmas, where Coulomb collisions are rare and cannot explain the observed states of quasi-equilibrium. Linear theory predicts that the…
Kappa distributions are ubiquitous in space and astrophysical poorly collisional plasmas, such as the solar wind, suggesting that microscopic and macroscopic properties of these non-equilibrium plasmas are highly conditioned by the…
We study the effects of heat flows and velocity shear on the parallel firehose instability in weakly collisional plasma flow. For this purpose we apply an anisotropic 16-moments MHD fluid closure model that takes into account the pressure…
The firehose and mirror instabilities are thought to arise in a variety of space and astrophysical plasmas, constraining the pressure anisotropies and drifts between particle species. The plasma stability depends on all species…
The recent simulations showed that the whistler heat flux instability, which presumably produces the most of quasi-parallel coherent whistler waves in the solar wind, is not efficient in regulating the electron heat conduction. In addition,…
Relative drifts between different species or particle populations are characteristic to solar plasma outflows, e.g., in the fast streams of the solar winds, coronal mass ejections and interplanetary shocks. This paper characterizes the…
In the solar wind plasma an excess of kinetic temperature along the background magnetic field stimulates proton firehose modes to grow if the parallel plasma beta parameter is sufficiently high, i.e., $\beta_{p \parallel}\gtrsim 1$. This…
The electron beam-plasma system is ubiquitous in the space plasma environment. Here, using a Darwin particle-in-cell method, the excitation of electrostatic and whistler instabilities by a gyrating electron beam is studied in support of…
We present an analysis of simultaneous particle and field measurements from the ARTEMIS spacecraft which demonstrate that quasi-parallel whistler waves in the solar wind can be generated locally by a bulk flow of halo electrons (whistler…
We study the electron firehose mode propagating parallel to the ambient magnetic field in the space plasma with anisotropic Cairns-distribution electrons. The dispersion relation, the wave frequency and the growth rate of electron firehose…
Recent studies have revealed new unstable regimes of the counter-beaming electrons specific to hot and dilute plasmas from astrophysical scenarios. The (counter-)beaming electron firehose instability (BEFI) is induced for highly oblique…
Nonthermal features are ubiquitously observed in electron velocity distribution functions in the solar wind, yet their origin in the collisionless, turbulent, expanding solar-wind plasma remains unclear. We investigate how solar-wind…