Dusty Plasmas in the Solar System

Abstract

Dust ‐ plasma interactions play an important role in our solar system. Comets, planetary rings, exposed dusty surfaces, the zodiacal dust cloud are all examples where dusty plasma effects shape the size and spatial distribution of small dust particles. Simultaneously, dust is often responsible for the composition, density and temperature of its plasma environment. The dynamics of charged dust particles can be surprisingly complex, fundamentally different from the well understood limits of gravity dominated motion (vanishing charge‐to‐mass ratio) or the adiabatic motion of electrons and ions. Here we focus on observations that are best explained via charging effects on single particle motion and point to possible future observations where collective dusty plasma effects are expected to be important.