Kinetic Simulations of Magnetopause Including Ionospheric Effect

这项研究计划将利用动力学粒子代码来分析与地球磁层顶上的等离子体传输有关的过程。全粒子模拟将被用来研究无碰撞重新连接所涉及的基本过程。然后将进行粒子/流体混合模拟，以确定磁层顶重新连接的大范围后果。在这些模拟中特别令人感兴趣的是，它们将使用多个离子物种，这可能导致Kelvin-Helmholz波的激发和突然的重新连接。突发性重联导致通量输送事件的形成，这种现象已在卫星资料中被多次观测到，但尚未得到令人满意的解释。

This research program will utilize a kinetic particle code to analyze the processes involved with plasma transport at the Earth's magnetopause. Full particle simulations will be used to study the fundamental processes involved in collisionless reconnection. Hybrid particle/fluid simulations will then be performed to determine the large scale consequences of magnetopause reconnection. Of particular interest in these simulations is the fact that they will use multiple ion species, which can lead to the excitation of Kelvin-Helmholz waves and bursty reconnection. Bursty reconnection results in the formation of Flux Transfer Events, which have been observed many times in satellite data, but have yet to be satisfactorily explained.