Related papers: Intermittent Electron-Only Reconnection at Lunar M…
The paper presents results of laboratory experiment modeling the interaction between Lunar magnetic anomalies and Solar wind. To model the LMA we use quadrupole magnetic field. The main dimentionless parameter of the problem, the ion…
Above lunar crustal magnetic anomalies, large fractions of solar wind electrons and ions can be scattered and stream back towards the solar wind flow, leading to a number of interesting effects such as electrostatic instabilities and waves.…
Mini-magnetospheres are small ion-scale structures that are well-suited to studying kinetic-scale physics of collisionless space plasmas. Such ion-scale magnetospheres can be found on local regions of the Moon, associated with the lunar…
Characterised by a surface bound exosphere and localised crustal magnetic fields, the Moon was considered as a passive object when solar wind interacts with it. However, the neutral particle and plasma measurements around the Moon by recent…
In this paper we present in-situ satellite data, theory and laboratory validation that show how small scale collisionless shocks and mini-magnetospheres can form on the electron inertial scale length. The resulting retardation and…
When the solar wind encounters the Moon, a plasma void forms downstream of it, known as the lunar wake. In regions where the magnetic field is quasi-parallel to the plasma-vacuum boundary normal, plasma refills the wake primarily along…
Magnetic reconnection requires the violation of the frozen-in condition which ties gyrating charged particles to the magnetic field inhibiting diffusion. Ongoing reconnection has been identified in near-Earth space as being responsible for…
Motivated by recent observations of "electron-only" magnetic reconnection, without an ion-scale sheet or ion outflows, in both the Earth's magnetosheath and in numerical simulations, we study the formation and reconnection of electron-scale…
Mildly relativistic shocks in magnetized electron-ion plasmas are investigated with 2D kinetic particle-in-cell simulations of unprecedentedly high resolution and large scale for conditions that may be found at internal shocks in blazar…
We point out that a conventional construction placed upon observations of accreting black holes, in which their nonthermal X-ray spectra are produced by inverse comptonization in a coronal plasma, suggests that the plasma is marginally…
The Moon is generally thought to have formed from the debris ejected by the impact of a planet-sized object with the proto-Earth towards the end of planetary accretion. Modeling of the impact process predicts that the lunar material was…
The solar wind plasma from the Sun interacts with the Moon, generating a wake structure behind it, since the Moon is to a good approximation an insulator, has no intrinsic magnetic field and a very thin atmosphere. The lunar wake in…
The origins of the lunar magnetic anomalies and swirls have long puzzled scientists.The prevailing theory posits that an ancient lunar dynamo core field magnetized extralunar meteoritic materials, leading to the current remnant magnetic…
Hybrid-Vlasov-Maxwell simulations of magnetized plasma turbulence including non-linear electron-inertia effects in a generalized Ohm's law are presented. When fluctuation energy is injected on scales sufficiently close to ion-kinetic…
Magnetic reconnection is a ubiquitous plasma process in which oppositely directed magnetic field lines break and rejoin, resulting in a change of the magnetic field topology. Reconnection generates magnetic islands: regions enclosed by…
Context: Recent satellite measurements in the turbulent magnetosheath of Earth have given evidence of an unusual reconnection mechanism that is driven exclusively by electrons. This newly observed process was called electron-only…
The Sub-keV Atom Reflecting Analyzer (SARA) instrument on the Indian Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft has produced for the first time an image of a lunar magnetic anomaly in backscattered hydrogen atoms. The image shows that a partial void of the…
We perform a high-resolution two-dimensional fully-kinetic numerical simulation of a turbulent plasma system with observation-driven conditions, in order to investigate the interplay between turbulence, magnetic reconnection, and particle…
In this paper we show a plausible mechanism that could lead to the formation of the Dark Lanes in Lunar Swirls, and the electromagnetic shielding of the lunar surface that results in the preservation of the white colour of the lunar…
Magnetic reconnection in partially ionized plasmas is a ubiquitous phenomenon spanning the range from laboratory to intergalactic scales, yet it remains poorly understood and relatively little studied. Here, we present results from a…