Jump relations for shocks in an anisotropic magnetized plasma

Abstract

The jump relations for shocks moving into a collision-free anisotropic magnetized plasma are investigated under the assumption of isotropy of the plasma behind the shock front. The plasma ahead of the shock is assumed to be stable against the fire-hose instability and the mirror instability. In order to facilitate comparison with the work of Bazer and Ericson on isotropic shocks our nomenclature has been adapted to theirs. It turns out that as in the case of isotropic shocks the density ratio can be at most four corresponding to γ=5/3, that the change in magnetic field is bounded and that except for the case of Alfven shocks the transverse parts of the magnetic field are collinear. It is further shown that the influence of the anisotropy is greatest for nearly equal thermal and magnetic energy densities. In the case of negative anisotropy no compressive shocks are possible with a major decrease in magnetic field if the thermal energy density much exceeds the magnetic energy density. A new kind of shock is shown to result from the analysis, the major effect of which is to destroy the anisotropy with only small changes in density, magnetic field and velocity vector. Its propagation speed is unbounded. Furthermore it has turned out that compressive, magnetic field increasing shocks have lower bounds in the density jump and magnetic field change for negative and positive anisotropy, respectively. In the collision-free case no unique entropy condition depending only on the total pressure components and densities can be given before the solution of the problem of shock structure. Therefore even expansive shocks may be admissible. The applicability of the isotropy assumption and ad-hoc-assumptions of other authors are briefly discussed.