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Two‐stream instability of electrons in the shock front
Author(s) -
Gedalin M.
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/1999gl900239
Subject(s) - instability , shock (circulatory) , physics , electron , front (military) , upstream (networking) , mechanics , upstream and downstream (dna) , relaxation (psychology) , shock front , computational physics , shock wave , meteorology , nuclear physics , medicine , psychology , computer network , social psychology , computer science
During their collisionless motion in the shock front electrons are efficiently accelerated by the de Hoffman‐Teller cross shock potential. Inside the shock ramp two electron beams are formed: those which are accelerated from upstream to downstream and those which come from the downstream region to match the upstream distribution. This electron distribution is two‐stream unstable. We estimate the typical temporal and spatial scales on which the instability develops. We argue that this instability could result in fast relaxation of the electron beams and formation of the observed flattopped distributions.