Published May 20, 2011 | Version v1
Journal article

THE EFFECTS OF ELECTRON-BEAM-INDUCED ELECTRIC FIELD ON THE GENERATION OF LANGMUIR TURBULENCE IN FLARING ATMOSPHERES

  • 1. Department of Mathematics, University of Bradford, Bradford BD7 1DP (United Kingdom)

Description

The precipitation of an electron beam injected into the solar atmosphere is studied for the generation of Langmuir wave turbulence in the presence of collisional and Ohmic losses. The system of quasi-linear time-dependent kinetic equations describing the evolution of beams and Langmuir waves is solved by using the summary approximation method. It is found that at upper atmospheric levels the self-induced electric field suppresses the generation of Langmuir turbulence to very small regions below injection. With further precipitation into deeper atmosphere the initial single power-law distributions of beam electrons are transformed into energy distributions with maxima at lower energies formed by collisional and Ohmic energy depletion. The electrons with lower energies (<20 keV) generate on large spatial scales intense low-hybrid and high-hybrid Langmuir waves with well-defined patterns in the corona while higher energy electrons generate moderate low-hybrid waves in the chromosphere. The maximum wave density appears at the maximum of the ambient density. The self-induced electric field reduces the level and makes the regions with low-hybrid Langmuir turbulence narrower in the corona and upper chromosphere. The higher the beam energy flux or its self-induced electric field, the narrower the regions with Langmuir turbulence. High-hybrid Langmuir waves in the form of multiple patterns in space (in the corona) and energy (below 20 keV) are found to be generated only by a very intense electron beam. The number of patterns in both dimensions is also shown to be significantly reduced by the self-induced electric field.

Availability note (English)

Available from http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/733/1/33

Additional details

Identifiers

Publishing Information

Journal Title
Astrophysical Journal
Journal Volume
733
Journal Issue
1
Journal Page Range
[8 p.]
ISSN
0004-637X
CODEN
ASJOAB