Publication Date:
2011-08-18
Description:
Previous work on electron heating mechanisms operating at the supercritical earth's bow shock is extended to the generally lower Mach number interplanetary shocks. This is done by studying electron velocity distributions observed both upstream and downstream of interplanetary shocks observed by ISEE 3 between August 1978 and December 1979. It is found that perpendicular heating accompanied by little or no parallel heating occurs at the weaker shocks but that parallel heating is dominant for the stronger shocks. When perpendicular heating is dominant, downstream velocity distributions are for the most part Gaussian at low energies (core) and Lorentzian at high energies (halo). When parallel heating is dominant, however, these distributions are flat-topped at low energies, having power law extensions to higher energies. At the weaker shocks, the observations are consistent with electron heating resulting from conservation of the magnetic moment, whereas at the stronger shocks the heating is quite similar to that observed at the earth's bow shock.
Keywords:
ASTROPHYSICS
Type:
Journal of Geophysical Research (ISSN 0148-0227); 88; 9949-995
Format:
text
