Suprathermal electron loss cone distributions in the solar wind: Ulysses observations

Journal Article · Mon Jul 01 04:00:00 EDT 1996 · AIP Conference Proceedings

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.51401· OSTI ID:574655

Phillips, J L; Feldman, W C; Gosling, J T ^[1]; Hammond, C M ^[2]; Forsyth, R J ^[3]

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1. Los Alamos National Laboratory (United States)
2. SRI International (United States)
3. Imperial College (United Kingdom)

We present observations by the Ulysses solar wind plasma experiment of a new class of suprathermal electron signatures. At low solar latitudes and heliocentric distances beyond 3.37 AU Ulysses encountered seven intervals, ranging in duration from 1 hour to 22 hours, in which the suprathermal distributions included an antisunward field-aligned beam and a return population with a flux dropout typically spanning {plus_minus}60{degree} from the sunward field-aligned direction. All events occurred between the forward and reverse shocks or waves bounding corotating interaction regions (CIRs). The observations support a scenario in which the sunward-moving electrons result from reflection of the prevailing antisunward field-aligned beam at magnetic field compressions downstream from the spacecraft, with wide loss cones caused by the relatively weak mirror ratio. This hypothesis requires that the field magnitude within the CIRs actually increased locally with increasing field-aligned distance from the Sun. {copyright} {ital 1996 American Institute of Physics.}

• OSTI ID: 574655
• Report Number(s): CONF-9506256--
• Journal Information: AIP Conference Proceedings, Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 382; ISSN 0094-243X; ISSN APCPCS
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

66 PHYSICS
DISTRIBUTION FUNCTIONS
ELECTRON SPECTRA
INTERPLANETARY MAGNETIC FIELDS
PLASMA DIAGNOSTICS
SOLAR WIND
SPACE VEHICLES