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H2020Individual fellowship2015–2018

SoWHat · Solar Wind Heating and Turbulence

Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2015-11-01 → 2018-10-31
EU contribution
€264,668
Participants
2
Scheme
MSCA-IF-GF

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

Solar Wind Heating and Turbulence

In a collisionless, magnetized plasma, particles may stream freely along magnetic-field lines, leading to ''phase mixing'' of their distribution function and consequently to smoothing out of any ''compressive'' fluctuations (of density, pressure, etc.,). This rapid mixing underlies Landau damping of these fluctuations in a quiescent plasma, one of the most fundamental physical phenomena that make plasma different from a conventional fluid. Nevertheless, broad power-law spectra of compressive fluctuations are observed in turbulent astrophysical plasmas (most vividly, in the solar wind) under conditions conducive to strong Landau damping. Elsewhere in nature, such spectra are normally associated with fluid turbulence, where energy cannot be dissipated in the inertial scale range and is therefore cascaded from large scales to small. The major objective of the project has been to explain this surprisingly fluid dynamics.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

Observations of solar wind (SW) turbulence have usually emphasized magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) scales where the Kolmogorov scaling f −5/3 of the magnetic spectra is frequently observed. These spectra arethought to result from strongly nonlinear interactions. However, the question as to how turbulence of the MHD scales terminates its cascade at smaller (kinetic) scales is still hotly debated. Answering thisquestion is indeed fundamental to understanding the processes of particle acceleration and plasma heating in the SW and in other astrophysical plasmas. This project aims at studying the mechanisms of energy dissipation in solar wind. We will use a innovative multiple approach that combines in-situ fields and particles data available from the multispacecraft missions, numerical simulations and theories to model the complex behavior of turbulence cascade at kinetic scales where it is dissipated.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • ECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE · PALAISEAU CEDEXCoordinatorFrance
  • THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA · OaklandUnited States

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union