Spontaneous generation of self-organized solitary wave structures at Earth's magnetopause

Trines, R. and Bingham, R. and Dunlop, M. W. and Vaivads, A. and Davies, J. A. and Mendonça, J. T. and Silva, L. O. and Shukla, P. K. (2007) Spontaneous generation of self-organized solitary wave structures at Earth's magnetopause. Physical Review Letters, 99 (20). 205006. ISSN 1079-7114 (https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.205006)

[thumbnail of Trines-etal-PRL2007-generation-of-self-organized-solitary-wave-structures] PDF. Filename: Trines_etal_PRL2007_generation_of_self_organized_solitary_wave_structures.pdf
Final Published Version
Download (900kB)

Abstract

Spontaneous formation of solitary wave structures has been observed in Earth’s magnetopause, and is shown to be caused by the breakup of a zonal flow by the action of drift wave turbulence. Here we show matched observations and modeling of coherent, large-scale solitary electrostatic structures, generated during the interaction of short-scale drift wave turbulence and zonal flows at the Earth’s magnetopause. The observations were made by the Cluster spacecraft and the numerical modeling was performed using the wave-kinetic approach to drift wave-zonal flow interactions. Good agreement between observations and simulations has been found, thus explaining the emergence of the observed solitary structures as well as confirming earlier theoretical predictions of their existence.

  • Item type:Article
    ID code:51798
    Dates:
    Date
    Event
    16 November 2007
    Published
    Notes:© American Physical Society
    Subjects:Science > Physics
    Department:Faculty of Science > Physics
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date deposited:19 Feb 2015 15:25
    Last modified:08 Apr 2024 22:03
    Related URLs:
    URI:https://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/51798
CORE (COnnecting REpositories)