Parametric instabilities of Alfven waves in a multispecies plasma: Kinetic effects

Parametric instabilities of a circularly polarized Alfven wave in a multispecies magnetized plasma are considered. An analytic kinetic description and hybrid simulations for the linear behavior of the instabilities are given. It is found that, even for low-β regimes, both the kinetic effects and the presence of heavy ions substantially modify the characteristics of parametric instabilities as compared to the fluid model. The decay instability can be severely quenched in a plasma composed of massless electrons, protons, and alpha particles when the alphas are slightly hotter than the protons. These results could be important in describing the heating processes of heavy ions in the solar corona