Publication Date:
2019-07-13
Description:
Electron heating at Earth's quasiperpendicular bow shock has been surmised to be due to the combined effects of a quasistatic electric potential and scattering through wave-particle interaction. Here we report the observation of electron distribution functions indicating a new electron heating process occurring at the leading edge of the shock front. Incident solar wind electrons are accelerated parallel to the magnetic field toward downstream, reaching an electron-ion relative drift speed exceeding the electron thermal speed. The bulk acceleration is associated with an electric field pulse embedded in a whistler-mode wave. The high electron-ion relative drift is relaxed primarily through a nonlinear current-driven instability. The relaxed distributions contain a beam traveling toward the shock as a remnant of the accelerated electrons. Similar distribution functions prevail throughout the shock transition layer, suggesting that the observedacceleration and thermalization is essential to the cross-shock electron heating.
Keywords:
Solar Physics
Type:
GSFC-E-DAA-TN60656
,
Physical Review Letters (ISSN 0031-9007) (e-ISSN 1079-7114); 120; 22; 225101
Format:
text
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