English

Turbulence in the outer heliosphere

Space Physics 2022-08-31 v1 Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Solar and Stellar Astrophysics Fluid Dynamics Plasma Physics

Abstract

The solar wind (SW) and local interstellar medium (LISM) are turbulent media. Their interaction is governed by complex physical processes and creates heliospheric regions with significantly different properties in terms of particle populations, bulk flow and turbulence. Our knowledge of the solar wind turbulence \nature and dynamics mostly relies on near-Earth and near-Sun observations, and has been increasingly improving in recent years due to the availability of a wealth of space missions, including multi-spacecraft missions. In contrast, the properties of turbulence in the outer heliosphere are still not completely understood. In situ observations by Voyager and New Horizons, and remote neutral atom measurements by IBEX strongly suggest that turbulence is one of the critical processes acting at the heliospheric interface. It is intimately connected to charge exchange processes responsible for the production of suprathermal ions and energetic neutral atoms. This paper reviews the observational evidence of turbulence in the distant SW and in the LISM, advances in modeling efforts, and open challenges.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2207.14115,
  title  = {Turbulence in the outer heliosphere},
  author = {Federico Fraternale and Laxman Adhikari and Horst Fichtner and Tae K. Kim and Jens Kleimann and Sean Oughton and Nikolai V. Pogorelov and Vadim Roytershteyn and Charles W. Smith and Arcadi V. Usmanov and G P. Zank and Lingling Zhao},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2207.14115},
  year   = {2022}
}

Comments

82 pages, 31 figures. Paper accepted by Space Science Reviews (collection: The Heliosphere in the Local Interstellar Medium: Into the Unknown), and presented at the ISSI Workshop on November 8-12, 2021

R2 v1 2026-06-25T01:18:19.945Z