A quantitative investigation of plasma transport rate via the Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability can improve our understanding of solar-wind-magnetosphere coupling processes. Simulation studies provide a broad range of transport rates by using different measurements based on different initial conditions and under different plasma descriptions, which makes cross literature comparison difficult. In this study, the KH instability under similar initial and boundary conditions (i.e., applicable to the Earth’s magnetopause environment) is simulated by Hall MHD with test particles and hybrid simulations. Both simulations give similar particle mixing rates. However, plasma is mainly transported through a few big magnetic islands caused by KH driven reconnection in the fluid simulation, while magnetic islands in the hybrid simulation are small and patchy. Anisotropic temperature can be generated in the nonlinear stage of the KH instability, in which specific entropy and magnetic moment are not conserved. This can have an important consequence on the development of secondary processes within the KH instability as temperature asymmetry can provide free energy for wave growth. Thus, the double-adiabatic theory is not applicable and a more sophisticated equation of state is desired to resolve meso-scale process (e.g., KH instability) for a better understanding of the multi-scale coupling process.
This collection hosts the data associated with the journal article, Comparison between fluid simulation with test particles and hybrid simulation for the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability. The full-text article is published in the JGR: Space Physics journal.
Submissions from 2018
Figure 1: Fluid With Test Particle and Hybrid Simulation, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 2: Selected Results of Fluid with Test Particle Simulation, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 3: Selected Results of Hybrid Simulation, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 4: The Anisotropic Value for Fluid with Test Particle Simulation and Hybrid Simulation, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 5: The Ratio of Parallel and Perpendicular Temperature for Fluid with Test Particle Simulation and Hybrid Simulation, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 6: The Change of the Specific Entropy and the Parallel Term in Logarithmic Scale, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Figure 7: The Geometric Mean of Magnetic Moment Enhancement and Kinetic Energy Enhancement, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
Plot Tools, Xuanye Ma, Peter Delamere, Katariina Nykyri, Brandon Burkholder, Bishwa Neupane, and Rachel C. Rice
