Electron vortex generation in earth's collisionless bow shock: MMS observationsShow others and affiliations
2024 (English)In: Journal of Geophysical Research - Space Physics, ISSN 2169-9380, E-ISSN 2169-9402, Vol. 129, no 9, article id e2024JA032980Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
In astrophysics and space, supercritical shock is generated when an object interacts with an incoming supersonic plasma stream. Its downstream plasmas are highly turbulent, containing abundant vortices on all scales from magnetohydrodynamic to electron gyroscales. Understanding the production of these vortices is at the forefront, especially on the electron scale. Using ultrafast measurements of NASA's Magnetospheric Multiscale spacecraft, we report on the fortunate multi-spacecraft observation of the formation of an electron vortex directly generated inside the Earth's quasi-parallel bow shock transition and propagated to the downstream turbulent magnetosheath. The vortex is generated inside the shock transition by anisotropic ∼100–600 eV electrons trapped in an ion-scale magnetic hole which could show a tornado-like magnetic morphology. Our results demonstrate that the electron vortex can develop not only as a product of the forward cascade but also from the shock transition into its downstream turbulence, which adds to the short-scale turbulence and dissipation.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
American Geophysical Union (AGU), 2024. Vol. 129, no 9, article id e2024JA032980
Keywords [en]
collisionless shock, electron vortex, magnetic hole, magnetosheath, mms, turbulence
National Category
Fusion, Plasma and Space Physics
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-230162DOI: 10.1029/2024JA032980ISI: 001316162100001Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85204681651OAI: oai:DiVA.org:umu-230162DiVA, id: diva2:1902823
2024-10-022024-10-022024-10-02Bibliographically approved