Dissipation Of Turbulent Fluctuations Research Articles

Association of intermittency with electron heating in the near-Sun solar wind

ABSTRACT Several studies in the near-Earth environment show that intermittent structures are important sites of energy dissipation and particle energization. Recent Parker Solar Probe (PSP) data, sampled in the near-Sun environment, have shown that proton heating is concentrated near coherent structures, suggesting local heating of protons by turbulent cascade in this region. However, whether electrons exhibit similar behaviour in the near-Sun environment is not clear. Here, we address this question using PSP data collected near the Sun during the first seven orbits. We use the partial variance of increments (PVI) technique to identify coherent structures. We find that electron temperature is preferentially enhanced near strong discontinuities. Our results provide strong support for the inhomogeneous heating of electrons in the ‘young’ solar wind associated with the dissipation of turbulent fluctuations near intermittent structures.

The role of turbulence in coronal heating and solar wind expansion.

Plasma in the Sun's hot corona expands into the heliosphere as a supersonic and highly magnetized solar wind. This paper provides an overview of our current understanding of how the corona is heated and how the solar wind is accelerated. Recent models of magnetohydrodynamic turbulence have progressed to the point of successfully predicting many observed properties of this complex, multi-scale system. However, it is not clear whether the heating in open-field regions comes mainly from the dissipation of turbulent fluctuations that are launched from the solar surface, or whether the chaotic 'magnetic carpet' in the low corona energizes the system via magnetic reconnection. To help pin down the physics, we also review some key observational results from ultraviolet spectroscopy of the collisionless outer corona.

RECONNECTION AND ELECTRON TEMPERATURE ANISOTROPY IN SUB-PROTON SCALE PLASMA TURBULENCE

Turbulent behavior at sub-proton scales in magnetized plasmas is important for a full understanding of the energetics of astrophysical flows such as the solar wind. We study the formation of electron temperature anisotropy due to reconnection in the turbulent decay of sub-proton scale fluctuations using two dimensional, particle-in-cell (PIC) plasma simulations with realistic electron-proton mass ratio and a guide field out of the simulation plane. A fluctuation power spectrum with approximately power law form is created down to scales of order the electron gyroradius. In the dynamic magnetic field topology, which gradually relaxes in complexity, we identify the signatures of collisionless reconnection at sites of X-point field geometry. The reconnection sites are generally associated with regions of strong parallel electron temperature anisotropy. The evolving topology of magnetic field lines connected to a reconnection site allows spatial mixing of electrons accelerated at multiple, spatially separated reconnection regions. This leads to the formation of multi-peaked velocity distribution functions with a strong parallel temperature anisotropy. In a three-dimensional system, supporting the appropriate wave vectors, the multi-peaked distribution functions would be expected to be unstable to kinetic instabilities, contributing to dissipation. The proposed mechanism of anisotropy formation is also relevant to space and astrophysical systems where the evolution of the plasma is constrained by linear temperature anisotropy instability thresholds. The presence of reconnection sites leads to electron energy gain, nonlocal velocity space mixing and the formation of strong temperature anisotropy; this is evidence of an important role for reconnection in the dissipation of turbulent fluctuations.

The energy and dissipation of turbulent fluctuations of wind velocity and temperature in the boundary layer of the atmosphere

The relationships between the energy of small-scale turbulence and its dissipation rate are studied based on the data of long-term high-frequency measurements of temperature and wind velocity fluctuations in urban area. It is shown that the energy of wind velocity turbulent fluctuations is linearly related to the dissipation rate ɛ. The proportionality coefficient between turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) and ɛ is dimensional and does not depend on the stratification of the atmosphere, the Richardson number, or the Monin-Obukhov scale. Measurements in different seasons show that this coefficient can be related to the mean velocity of adiabatic motions (sound speed or air temperature), which enables one to select a more universal constant, γ. A linear relationship between the temperature fluctuations variance (the characteristic of the inner energy of turbulence) and their dissipation rate is also shown. The revealed proportionality is confirmed by measurements in urban and forest conditions, as well as in the surface layer over a flat desert terrain.

Consequences of the second law for a turbulent fluid flow

Second Law statements in thermomechanics applicable to turbulent fluid flow, in which the internal energy in a macroscopic field theory includes contributions both from molecular vibrations and from turbulent fluctuations, are discussed. In the absence of turbulence, these statements naturally reduce to the known and accepted Second Law statements for a nonturbulent medium. The usual version of the Second Law statements — which deny the existence of perpetual motion and place restrictions on the constitutive equations —is extended here in the presence of turbulence; and an additional statement is introduced associated with the tendency of turbulent fluctuations to decay in the absence of external work or the addition of thermal heat. The mathematical representations of various Second Law statements are then used to derive several restrictions on the response variables of the macroscopic turbulence theory. Examples of such variables include the rates of production and dissipation of turbulent fluctuations, the rate of thermal entropy production, internal energy (involving constitutive coefficients which may be taken to be the thermal and turbulent specific heats), turbulent viscosity coefficients and other response functions which control the degree of flow “anisotropy” in the medium. These Second Law restrictions are then applied to a recent theory of macroscopic turbulent flow by the present authors in which fairly general constitutive equations are presented for the dependent variables of the theory. It is found that not only is the range of values of several constitutive coefficients limited by these Second Law restrictions, but the presence of a number of terms in the constitutive equations is entirely denied.

Molecular dissipation of turbulent fluctuations in the convective mixed layer part II: Height variations of characteristic time scales and experimental test of molecular dissipation models

Extensive turbulence measurements from the Limagne and Beauce experiments were used to compute a characteristic time scale of the turbulence field (Τ = second moment/dissipation rate) for turbulent kinetic energy, temperature and humidity variances, and temperature-humidity covariance. The height variations of these time scales were analysed. The characteristic half-time scale Τ/2 of the turbulent velocity field was found, as expected, to be of the same order of magnitude as the large-eddy time scale Τ L = Zi/w*, showing that the turbulence structure is controlled by large eddies in the bulk of the mixed layer. The increase of Τ/2 above z/Z i ∼- 0.7 implies, however, that this time scale is no longer relevant to destruction of turbulent kinetic energy in the statically stable region with negative heat fluxes. An effective time scale Τeff, introduced by Zeman (1975), has been computed and its behaviour discussed. The scales for θ′ 2, q′2, and θ′q′ were found to be much shorter than Τ. Furthermore, a significant difference in behaviour was also revealed between the characteristic time scales of temperature and humidity fields in the stable layer. By using these experimental estimates, we tested some of the models for molecular dissipations, which are currently in use in higher order closure atmospheric boundary-layer models. The parameterized dissipation rates for θ′ 2, and q′ 2 agree well qualitatively with experimental estimates in the bulk of the mixed layer. In the stable layer, however, the parameterized dissipation rate e θ tends to become larger than the experimental ones although the parameterized dissipation rate e q still agrees with the experimental ones. For the molecular dissipation of θ′q′, this current model becomes physically inconsistent in the middle part of the mixed layer, because this term may become a production term for temperature-humidity covariance.