Global Structure and Dominant Particle Acceleration Mechanism of the Heliosheath: Definitive Conclusions

Abstract

Abstract During its exploration of the heliosheath, the region that lies between the termination shock of the solar wind and the heliopause that separates the solar wind from the local interstellar medium, the Voyager 1 spacecraft (V1) in 2012 encountered an apparent boundary where there was a precipitous decrease in energetic particles accelerated in the heliosheath, the so-called anomalous cosmic rays (ACRs), and from the occasional plasma density measurements on V1, a density comparable to the expected density in the interstellar medium. In 2013, the Voyager principal investigators announced that this apparent boundary was the heliopause and that V1 had entered the interstellar medium. In 2014, Fisk & Gloeckler presented a detailed model that demonstrated that the apparent boundary was simply an internal surface within the heliosheath, across which compressed solar wind flows and will continue to flow until it encounters the actual heliopause. There is compelling observational evidence that the model of Fisk & Gloeckler for the nose region of the heliosheath is correct: V1 did not cross the heliopause in 2012 and is not now in the interstellar medium. There is also compelling observational evidence that the ACRs are accelerated in the heliosheath by the pump acceleration mechanism of Fisk & Gloeckler. The success of the models of Fisk & Gloeckler confirms that the plasma in the nose region of the heliosheath consists of two separate components, the pickup ions and ACRs, and the thermal solar wind, and as a unique plasma is worthy of more study and, if possible, more exploration.