HR: 1330h
AN: SM52B-0581    [PDF]
TI: Kinetic Jump Conditions and Vlasov Simulations of 1-D Electrostatic Shocks and Contact Discontinuities in Collisionless Plasma
AU: * Tsai, T
EM: tctsai@jupiter.ss.ncu.edu.tw
AF: Institute of Space Science, National Central University, Chung-Li, 320-01 Taiwan
AU: Lyu, L
EM: lyu@jupiter.ss.ncu.edu.tw
AF: Institute of Space Science, National Central University, Chung-Li, 320-01 Taiwan
AU: Lyu, L
EM: lyu@jupiter.ss.ncu.edu.tw
AF: Department of Atmospheric Science, National Central University, Chung-Li, 320-01 Taiwan
AB: Kinetic jump conditions of one-dimensional electrostatic shocks and contact discontinuities (CDs) are studied analytically and verified by Vlasov simulations. Kinetic jump conditions can provide information on heat flux and electron-ion temperature ratio on both upstream and downstream boundaries. For a steady shock structure in electron time scale with uniform boundary conditions, a set of equations needs to be fulfilled. In most cases, only approximate solutions can be found, which indicate that shock transition region must be a time-dependent structure in electron time scale. Our analytic solutions also indicate that different electron-ion temperature ratio on upstream boundary can result in different potential jump and plasma heating across the shock ramp. These analytic solutions are consistent with numerical results obtained in Vlasov simulations. Jump conditions of an electrostatic CD are the same as jump conditions of a magnetized CD propagating parallel to the ambient magnetic field. It is found that a steady electrostatic CD requires different electron-ion temperature ratios on upstream boundary and on downstream boundary. Using the kinetic jump conditions as boundary conditions, steady CD structures are found in our Vlasov simulations. Differences between our simulation results and previous simulation results of CDs will be discussed.
DE: 7811 Discontinuities
DE: 7815 Electrostatic structures
DE: 7827 Kinetic and MHD theory
DE: 7843 Numerical simulation studies
DE: 7851 Shock waves
SC: SPA - Magnetospheric Physics [SM]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting