Suppression of Magnetic Reconnection at Saturn's Low‐Latitude Magnetopause

Fuselier, S. A.; Petrinec, S. M.; Sawyer, R. P.; Mukherjee, J.; Masters, A.

doi:10.1029/2020ja027895

Cited by 12 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 24 publications

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“…Of course, the FTE may have been generated under different magnetopause conditions and may have convected along the magnetopause to a new location to be observed by Cassini. We also investigated the electron data for evidence of reconnection signatures in the magnetosheath, similar to the investigation of Fuselier et al, (2014Fuselier et al, ( , 2020. We found field-aligned magnetospheric electrons in the magnetosheath which shows evidence of reconnection locally at the magnetopause crossing (at all our FTEs except for the 08-Aug-2008).…”

Section: Diamagnetic Suppression Of Reconnection At Saturn's Magnetopsupporting

confidence: 60%

“…This energization is not observed upon leaving ("after") the FTE which shows that this energization is taking place inside the FTE, and that the energized electrons are streaming along the magnetic field. Although it should be noted that, the measurement for the enhanced electrons (green line) has a larger spread in pitch angle, and therefore there will be a small contribution from electrons with slightly higher pitch 2.8 Magnetopause plasma observations and analysis of streaming electrons Similar to Fuselier et al, (2014Fuselier et al, ( ,2020, we analyzed the magnetopause crossings for streaming electrons in the magnetosheath which provide evidence that reconnection is taking place at the magnetopause locally to the spacecraft. Figure 6 shows plasma observations for a magnetopause crossing (02-May-2008) where an FTE was observed.…”

Section: Accepted Articlementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Once Cassini is in the magnetosheath, ELS continues to observe the magnetospheric electron population as evidenced by the higher fluxes at higher energies (~1000 eV), at McAndrews et al, 2008;Badman et al, 2013;Fuselier et al, 2014Fuselier et al, , 2020Sawyer et al, 2019), as well as at Earth (e.g. Gosling et al, 1990;Fuselier et al, 1997Fuselier et al, , 2012.…”

Section: Accepted Articlementioning

confidence: 99%

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Flux Transfer Events at a Reconnection‐Suppressed Magnetopause: Cassini Observations at Saturn

et al. 2021

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Section: Diamagnetic Suppression Of Reconnection At Saturn's Magnetopsupporting

confidence: 60%

Section: Accepted Articlementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Accepted Articlementioning

confidence: 99%

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Flux Transfer Events at a Reconnection‐Suppressed Magnetopause: Cassini Observations at Saturn

et al. 2021

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“…Slavin et al 2009) and dynamics in the magnetospheres of the outer planets (e.g. Vasyliunas 1983;McAndrews et al 2008;Fuselier et al 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Kinetic entropy-based measures of distribution function non-Maxwellianity: theory and simulations

et al. 2020

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We investigate kinetic entropy-based measures of the non-Maxwellianity of distribution functions in plasmas, i.e. entropy-based measures of the departure of a local distribution function from an associated Maxwellian distribution function with the same density, bulk flow and temperature as the local distribution. First, we consider a form previously employed by Kaufmann & Paterson (J. Geophys. Res., vol. 114, 2009, A00D04), assessing its properties and deriving equivalent forms. To provide a quantitative understanding of it, we derive analytical expressions for three common non-Maxwellian plasma distribution functions. We show that there are undesirable features of this non-Maxwellianity measure including that it can diverge in various physical limits and elucidate the reason for the divergence. We then introduce a new kinetic entropy-based non-Maxwellianity measure based on the velocity-space kinetic entropy density, which has a meaningful physical interpretation and does not diverge. We use collisionless particle-in-cell simulations of two-dimensional anti-parallel magnetic reconnection to assess the kinetic entropy-based non-Maxwellianity measures. We show that regions of non-zero non-Maxwellianity are linked to kinetic processes occurring during magnetic reconnection. We also show the simulated non-Maxwellianity agrees reasonably well with predictions for distributions resembling those calculated analytically. These results can be important for applications, as non-Maxwellianity can be used to identify regions of kinetic-scale physics or increased dissipation in plasmas.

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“…These must remain speculative statements until future related analysis takes place. As discussed in case study 1, heating events at locally closed magnetopause may be magnetically connected to a remote reconnection site, which may be more probable as magnetic reconnection is common at Saturn's magnetopause (Fuselier et al, 2020). In the current study, the electron heating measured at Saturn's magnetopause was examined for evidence of magnetic reconnection.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 88%

Electron Bulk Heating at Saturn's Magnetopause

Cheng

Achilleos

Masters

et al. 2020

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The magnetopause (MP) is the natural boundary of a planetary magnetosphere. It is formed by the interaction between the solar wind and planetary magnetosphere. At Saturn, it separates the magnetospheric magnetic field and plasma (mainly from the moon Enceladus) from the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) and solar wind plasma that has to flow around the magnetospheric obstacle (Baines et al., 2018). Cassini observations of magnetic field and plasma have also revealed that the disk-like magnetosphere imposes an "inflation" of the magnetopause at near-equatorial latitudes (Pilkington et al., 2014).Magnetic reconnection is an important process at this boundary as it can energize plasma via the release of magnetic energy when the fields undergo a topological change to a lower energy state (Øieroset et al., 2001). The signature of this process is heated high speed plasma jets (Yamada et al., 2010). Direct evidence of magnetic reconnection signatures has been observed at Saturn's magnetopause. For example, McAndrews et al. (2008) reported two magnetopause crossings with heating in the electrons and ions along field lines just outside the magnetopause that is highly suggestive of energization comparable to that associated with the reconnection process at Earth.

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Suppression of Magnetic Reconnection at Saturn's Low‐Latitude Magnetopause

Cited by 12 publications

References 24 publications

Flux Transfer Events at a Reconnection‐Suppressed Magnetopause: Cassini Observations at Saturn

Flux Transfer Events at a Reconnection‐Suppressed Magnetopause: Cassini Observations at Saturn

Kinetic entropy-based measures of distribution function non-Maxwellianity: theory and simulations

Electron Bulk Heating at Saturn's Magnetopause

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