Study of Space Plasmas

STUDY OF SOME LINEAR AND NONLINEAR
PHENOMENA IN SPACE PLASMAS
A THESIS
SUBMITTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MUMBAI
FOR THE
PH.D. (SCIENCE) DEGREE IN PHYSICS
Submitted By
DEVANANDHAN S
UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF
PROF. SATYAVIR SINGH
INDIAN INSTITUTE OF GEOMAGNETISM

PLOT NO. 5, SECTOR 18, KALAMBOLI HIGHWAY, NEW PANVEL (W)
NAVI MUMBAI- 410 218, MAHARASHTRA, INDIA
DECEMBER 2013
Dedicated to my parents...
ii
STATEMENT BY THE CANDIDATE
As required by the University Ordinances 770, I wish to state that the work embodied in this
thesis titled Study of some linear and nonlinear phenomena in space plasmas forms my own
contribution to the research work carried out under the guidance of Prof. S. V. Singh at the Indian
Institute of Geomagnetism, New Panvel, Navi Mumbai. This work has not been submitted for
any other degree of this or any other University. Wherever references have been made to previous
works of others, it has been clearly indicated as such and included in the Bibliography.
Signature of Candidate
Full Name: Devanandhan S
Certified by
Signature of Guide
Name: Prof. S. V. Singh
iii
Statement required under 0.770
Statement No. 1
I hereby declare that the work described in the thesis has not been submitted previously to this
or any other University for Ph.D or any other degree.
Statement No. 2
Whether the work is based on the discovery of new facts by the candidate or of new relations
of facts observed by others, and how the work tends to the general advancement of knowledge.
The first chapter provides the basics of the thesis work by introducing about space plasma
environments and variety of wave features. Several aspects to study such linear and nonlinear phenomena are briefly discussed. In the following chapters, the original work done by the candidate
is described. This includes new theoretical models for unmangetized and magnetized electronand ion-acoustic waves using superthermal particle distribution. In the final chapter, the results are
summarized and scope for future work is discussed.
New findings from the work are listed below:

The superthermal index, , gives better fit for observations having Maxwellian-like core and
high energy tails. Theoretical results predict higher electric field values for highly superthermal
plasmas. The inclusion of finite temperature effects, reduces the electric field values significantly.
Beam parameters such as beam temperature and beam velocity affects the regime of solitary
waves. A four component electron beam plasma system in unmagnetized plasma is studied and
shown that their soliton velocities are higher than the three component plasma system. Comparison
iv
of two electron and three electron component plasma system is described for specific observation
in the day side auroral zone.
Arbitrary amplitude unmagnetized plasmas predicts only negative polarity soliton solutions.
The positive polarity potential structures may be obtained by lifting the restrictions on densities
and allowing them to have arbitrary values rather than fixed observational values.
Obliquely propagating electron-acoustic waves in a pure electron-ion plasma revealed that

the upper limit of mach number is independent of the angle of propagation. Similar to the case
of unmagnetized plasmas, the inclusion of finite temperature reduces the electric field values in
magnetized plasmas as well.
Electron-acoustic solitons studied in magnetized plasma show significant increase in the

range of electric field values with increase in magnetic field values.
The complete analysis of four component electron-acoustic waves in magnetized plasma for
small amplitude limit predicts negative potential solitary structures. It has been observed that, the
variation of electric field amplitudes are consistent with the arbitrary amplitude case.
Ion-acoustic solitons with superthermal hot electron and cold ion are studied and the soliton
existence regimes are calculated. The finite temperature effect decreases the value of electric field
and gives better approximations to the observations.
Statement No. 3
The source from which this information has been derived and to the extent to which he has
based his work on the work of others, and shall indicate which portion or portions of his thesis he
claims as original.
The information mentioned is derived by the candidate during the course of research work
which is reported in the thesis. Some of the results presented in the thesis are published in the
following research articles:
Papers Published and communicated in Journals
(1) S. Devanandhan., S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Electron acoustic solitary waves with kappa
distributed electrons, Phys. Scr., 84, 025507, doi:10.1088/0031-8949/ 84/ 02/ 025507, 2011.
(2) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitons in

the presence of an electron beam and superthermal electrons, Nonlin. Processes Geophys., 18,
627-634, doi:10.5194/npg-18-627-2011, 2011.
(3) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic waves in

a magnetized plasma with kappa distributed ions, Phys. Plasmas, 19, 082314, doi:10.1063/
1.4743015, 2012.
(4) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Effect of ion temperature

on ion-acoustic solitary waves in a magnetized plasma in presence of superthermal electrons,
vi
Phys. Plasmas, 20,012306, doi:10.1063/1.4776710, 2013.
(5) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Small amplitude electron

acoustic solitons in a weakly magnetized superthermal plasmas, Manuscript is communicated,
2013.
Papers published in conference/symposium proceedings
(1) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Electrostatic solitary waves in multi-component

space plasmas, 1st PSSI-Plasma scholars colloquium, Institute for plasma research, Gandhinagar, Gujarat, India, 2012.
Papers presented in National and International conferences:
(1) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh and G. S. Lakhina, Electron acoustic solitary waves with kappadistributed electrons, AOGS (Asia Ocenia Geosciences Society), Hyderabad international convention centre, 5-9 July, 2010.
(2) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitary

waves in the presence of an electron beam and superthermal electrons, 26th National symposium on plasma science & Technology (PLASMA-2011) , Birla Institute of Technology, Patna,
20-23 December, 2011.
(3) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Electron acoustic waves in a magnetized

plasma with superthermal ions, 26th National symposium on plasma science & Technology
vii
(PLASMA-2011), Birla Institute of Technology, Patna, 20-23 December, 2011.
(4) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic solitary waves with kappa distributed ions, 17th National space science symposium (NSSS-2012),
Sri Venkateswara University, Tirupati, 14-17 February, 2012.
(5) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, and G. S. Lakhina, Obliquely propagating ion-acoustic solitary

waves with superthermal electrons, 17th National space science symposium (NSSS-2012), Sri
Venkateswara University, Tirupati, 14-17 February, 2012.
(6) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Obliquely propagating nonlinear electron acoustic waves with superthermal ions in magnetized plasmas, 39th COSPAR
scientific assembly, Mysore, 14-22 July, 2012.
(7) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Ion-acoustic solitary waves

with superthermal electrons in magnetized plasmas, 39th COSPAR scientific assembly, Mysore,
14-22 July, 2012.
(8) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitary

waves in magnetized plasmas with superthermal electrons and an electron beam, School on
astrophysical and space plasmas, LAquila, Italy, 02-08 September, 2012.
(9) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Oblique propagation of

electron acoustic solitons in magnetized plasmas with superthermal electrons, The 11th international school/symposium for space simulations, Taiwan, 21-27 July, 2013.
viii
Statement No. 4
Where a candidate presents joint work, he shall clearly state the portion which is his own contribution as distinguished from the portion contributed by his collaborators.
The papers as mentioned in Statement No. 3, the complete analytical and numerical computations are done by the candidate. Dr. Satyavir Singh helped in formulating the research problems
and taught various theoretical methods. Prof. G. S. Lakhina and Prof. R. Bharuthram helped in
the interpretation of the results obtained during the course of research work presented in this thesis.
(Prof. Satyavir Singh)
(Devanandhan S)
Guiding Teacher
Candidate
ix
Acknowledgements
It became possible to complete this doctoral thesis with the help and support of kind people around
me. I take great pleasure in expressing my sincere gratitude to them for giving their valuable time
and guidance.
First I am deeply indebted to my supervisor Prof. Satyavir Singh, Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, for his unconditional support and guidance. I have been extremely lucky and grateful to
get the opportunity to work with him. Since the beginning, he has encouraged me which has kept
my interest in this field alive. I have been able to complete my thesis due to his special attention. I
am extremely grateful for his advice, support and suggestions.
I avail this opportunity to express my heart-felt gratitude and respect for Prof. G. S. Lakhina, Visiting Professor, Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, for the valuable and intense scientific discussions
with him. He has always been giving his best suggestions to improve my work which often gave
new insights.
I would like to thank our collaborator Prof. R. Bharuthram, University of the Western Cape,
Bellville, South Africa, for his great help in interpretations of results and valuable suggestions.
I have been blessed to be a part of plasma physics research group with Prof. R. V. Reddy, Dr.
Suktisama Ghosh, Dr. Amar Kakad and Miss. Remya. I am very much grateful to them for giving
me their valuable time and constant help.
I express my sincere thanks to Prof. Ramesh Durbha Sai, Director, Prof. Archana Bhattacharyya,
ex- Director, Prof. Mita Rajaram, ex- Director-in-charge, Prof. S. G. Gokarn, ex-Director-incharge,
and Prof. S. Gurubaran, ex-Director-incharge, Indian Institute of Geomagnetism for their cooperation and encouragement during the course of my thesis.
I express my thanks to Mr. G. Jayakumar, Registrar, for his support in all the official matters. I take
this time to express my gratitude to Mrs. Divya Mehta and all the library staff for their support and
assistance. I am thankful to Mr. Susheel Kumar and staff members of computer and documentation
x
section for their immense support and making all things available to my need. I express my sincere
thanks to administration, accounts, stores and hindi sections for their for their tremendous support
and timely help.
I would like to thank Mr. M. Ponraj, Mr. S. Amirtharaj, Dr. Deenadayalan, Indian Institute of
Geomagnetism and Mr. M. Palanisamy, Bhabha Atomic Research Center, Mumbai for supporting
and encouraging me with their best wishes. I am very much thankful to my friends Miss. B.
Jayashree, Mr. Sudhansu Sekhar Das, Mr. Sandesh Shankar Khandagale, Mr. S. Manu and Mr. R.
Selvakumaran for their support and friendship.
I would like to thank my former and present colleagues Dr. Rashmi Rawat, Dr. Anand Kumar
Singh, Dr. Lakshmi Narayanan, Mr. Chinmaya Kumar Nayak, Miss. Nisha Nair, Dr. R. Dhanya,
Dr. Bhagavathiammal, Mr. Md. Arif, Mr. Prasanta Kumar Das, Dr. Ajeet Kumar Maurya, Dr.
Mahesh Srivasatava, Mr. N. Jeni Victor, Mr. J. L. V. Mahesh Babu, Mr. Virendra Yadav, Mr.
Sandeep Kumar, Mr. Jayanta Kumar Behera, Mr. Ankush Bhaskar, Mr. Sandeep Sathian, Miss.
Neethal Thomas and Mr. Muhammed Kutty.
I am also thankful to the all the scientists and staff members of the Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, Navi Mumbai who treated me, as their family member during the course period. I would
like to thank the Department of Science and Technology, New Delhi, for providing the funding
which helped me to meet my financial needs during this research.
Most important of all, I am deeply indebted to my parents, without whose blessings I would not
have reached this stage. I express my deep regards and love for my family members and well wishers for their constant encouragement, inspiration and moral support in this endeavor. Furthermore,
I owe it all to Almighty God for enriching me with a great learning experience and blessing me
with the virtues of self discipline, diligence, co-ordination and dedication in all respects.
Devanandhan S
Candidate
xi
Contents
Statement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
iv
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Introduction
1.1
Space plasma environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.1.1
The Sun and the solar wind . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.1.2
Interplanetary magnetic field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.1.3
Earths magnetospheric regions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.1.4
Plasmasphere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.1.5
Magnetosphere of other planets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.2
Theoretical methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.3
Governing equations in plasmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.3.1
Continuity equation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.3.2
Equation of motion and Maxwells equations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
xii
1.3.3
1.4
1.5
1.6
1.7
Equation of state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Waves in plasmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.4.1
Electron plasma wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1.4.2
Ion acoustic wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1.4.3
Electron acoustic wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Nonlinear methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
1.5.1
Korteweg-de Vries equation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.5.2
Pseudo-potential method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Velocity distribution functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

1.6.1
Maxwellian distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.6.2
Non-thermal distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1.6.3
Kappa distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Scope of the thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Electron acoustic waves in unmagnetized plasmas
21
2.1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.2
Electron acoustic waves in three component plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

2.2.1
Theoretical model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.2.2
Linear dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.2.3
Nonlinear analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
xiii
2.2.4
2.3
2.4
Numerical results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Electron acoustic waves in four component plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

2.3.1
2.3.2
Linear dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
2.3.3
2.3.4
Concluding remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Electron acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas
49
3.1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
3.2
Electron acoustic waves in an electron-ion magnetoplasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
3.3
3.4
3.2.1
3.2.2
Dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
3.2.3
3.2.4
Electron acoustic waves in four component magnetoplasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

3.3.1
3.3.2
Dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
3.3.3
3.3.4
xiv
Ion acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas

4.1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.2
Ion acoustic waves in electron ion plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
4.3
76
4.2.1
4.2.2
Numerical results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Conclusions and future work
92
5.1
Electron and ion acoustic waves in space plasmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
5.2
Suggestion for the future work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Bibliography
96
Synopsis
xv
Chapter 1
Introduction
1.1
Space plasma environment
Plasma is a quasineutral gas of charged and neutral particles where long range electromagnetic
interactions dominate the short range interatomic or intermolecular forces. More than 99% of the
known matter in the universe is in the plasma state. At a height of about 80 km and above from
the Earths surface, the neutral atmosphere gradually changes into a region containing ionized particles (ionosphere). The ionized matter becomes dominant with further increase in height. The
Earths magnetosphere and interplanetary space are almost completely ionized and are dominated
by collisionless plasma. Plasma contains nearly equal number of positive and negative charges,
which exhibits a collective behaviour. Plasmas are ubiquitous in astrophysical, space and laboratory environments. The nearest natural region dominated by plasmas is Earths ionosphere and
magnetosphere. The characteristics such as density and temperature of different plasma regions in
our solar system widely differ from each other. Some of these plasma regions are described briefly
in the following sections.
CHAPTER 1. Introduction
1.1.1
The Sun and the solar wind
Plasma emission from the Suns atmosphere is known as solar wind. It mainly consists of electrons
and protons and small fraction of Helium ions. The typical electron density in the solar wind is
around 5 cm3 . Sun has three types of visible layers namely (from innermost to outermost),
photosphere, chromosphere and corona. The temperature of photosphere is about 6000 K, and
above the photosphere, the temperature reaches about 1, 000, 000 K at the base of corona [Parks,
1991]. The Sun has a radius of approximately 700,000 km, of which the outer 100,000 km or so is
the convective zone (according to the mixing length models). At the bottom of the convective zone
densities are about 0.1 gm/cm3 , whereas at the top (the photosphere) it is about 2x107 gm/cm3
[Parker, 1983]. This large difference and high temperature in photosphere make corona to expand
at supersonic speeds and result in the emission of highly conducting plasma into the interplanetary
space. High temperature in solar atmosphere is also responsible for the solar wind as the thermal
velocities are larger than the escape velocity, resulting in the hot plasma flowing out.
1.1.2
Interplanetary magnetic field
The solar magnetic field carried by the solar wind tends to remain frozen in the streaming plasma
due to its very high conductivity. Suns magnetic field has been transported out with solar wind
beyond distant planets due to the slow diffusion of magnetic fields in highly conducting interplanetary space/medium. The solar magnetic field lines are carried into interplanetary space as
Archimedean spirals by the radial motion of solar wind resulting from solar rotation, and is called
the interplanetary magnetic field. The interplanetary magnetic field near the Earth is of the order of
5 nT. The highly conductive supersonic solar wind plasma interacts with the Earths magnetic field
lines and a bow shock wave is generated where the solar wind plasma is slowed down to subsonic
speeds and deflected. The region behind the bow shock where dense, hot thermalized subsonic
plasma exists is known as magnetosheath.
Figure 1.1: Schematic diagram of the Earths magnetosphere showing its plasma regions [Image
Courtesy: Rice University]
1.1.3
Earths magnetospheric regions
The boundary between the magnetosheath and terrestrial magnetic field is called magnetopause. It
forms at a distance where the solar wind dynamic pressure equals the magnetic pressure of Earths
field. The interplanetary magnetic field lines can not penetrate the terrestrial field lines, hence the
shocked solar wind plasma in the magnetosheath region gets deflected around terrestrial magnetic
field and forms a cavity. This cavity is known as magnetosphere. The kinetic pressure of the solar
wind plasma compresses the day side magnetosphere whereas the night side magnetic field lines
are stretched into long magnetotail in the direction of solar wind plasma flow to extend beyond
200 RE [Parks, 1991].
The magnetosheath plasma extends so deep at the magnetic poles so as to reach the Earths surface
through the cavity known as polar cusp (or sometimes the dayside cusp or the magnetospheric
cleft). Outermost parts of the polar cusp near the magnetopause, have been called interior cusp
(or entry layer). The region of magnetosheath plasma outside the magnetopause is called exterior
cusp. The thin layer near the nose of the magnetosphere has bulk flow of plasma in a direction close
to that of the plasma flow in the adjacent magnetosheath and is known as low-latitude boundary
layer. Open magnetic field lines adjacent to the magnetopause downstream of the polar cusps
expand as ever lengthening magnetic flux tubes, which produce the plasma mantle.
Magnetic field lines from the northern and southern halves of the magnetotail plasma merge and
extend Earthward through the centre of the magnetotail in a highly heated plasma region, the
plasma sheet. The energy density of the plasma in the plasma sheet region is comparable or larger
than the energy density of the local magnetic field [Vasyliunas, 1983]. The layers adjacent to the
plasma sheet above and below, with thermal energies having similar to the magnetosheath, but with
low densities, are plasma sheet boundary layers. Two magnetotail lobes lie between the plasma
mantle and plasma sheet boundary layers. They are characterized by low plasma densities and
strong magnetic fields. Various regions of the Earths magnetosphere are shown in Figure 1.1.
1.1.4
Plasmasphere
Deep inner magnetosphere is populated with the plasma entirely from the ionosphere and is known
as plasmasphere, which is located outward from the ionospheric boundary, the plasmapause. The
plasmasphere is a torus-shaped volume that surrounds the Earth and contains a relatively cool, high
density plasma of ionospheric origin (Shown in Figure 1.1). The plasma in this region corotates
with the Earth, but it can also flow along magnetic field lines from one hemisphere to the other. The
plasmapause is essentially the boundary between plasma that corotates with the Earth and plasma
that does not. In auroral region, auroral light emissions occur due to the precipitation of auroral
particles in the auroral oval. Polar cap and ionospheric trough lie in poleward and equatorward
directions respectively.
1.1.5
Magnetosphere of other planets
The planets Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Mars and Venus are known to have planetary magnetospheres
or magnetosphere-like structures similar to that of the magnetosphere of the Earth. However, the
strength of the magnetosphere vary by the intrinsic strength of the associated magnetic fields and
plasmas. For example, the magnetosphere of Mercury is tiny compared to that of the Earths, while
Jupiters is enormous. Generally, a true magnetosphere exists when the central object possess a
magnetic field of sufficient strength. In addition, magnetosphere-like structure similar to that of
Venus may occur when the central object is too weak to produce a true magnetosphere.
1.2
Theoretical methods
In a plasma, it is relatively easier to describe the motion of charged particles if origin of the fields
(electric and magnetic) was external. The motion of charged particles in electric and magnetic
fields can be described by solving the equation of motion for each individual particle. However,
due to the motion of the charged particles, the local charge concentrations are created and hence
electric fields. Also, their motion can generate electric currents and magnetic fields. Thus, due
to the generation of internal electric and magnetic fields, plasma physics is more complicated and
difficult to understand. In order to obtain full solution of the problem one has to consider effect
of individual particles on each other and solve the simultaneous coupled equations that is not
easy either. Therefore, depending on the problem to be studied certain approximations need to
be considered to arrive at the solution. Hence, based on suitability of the particular problem the
various methods used in plasma physics are described below [Baumjohann and Treumann, 1996]:
Single particle motion: The dynamics of particles under the influence of external electric and magnetic fields is described by equations of single particle motion. We assume here that the charged
particles do not interact with each other and the external magnetic field is not affected by the field
produced by motion of charged particles. This method is valid only where the collective behaviour
of plasma is negligible. This method is found to be very useful to study the low density plasma,
like in the ring current region.
Fluid theory: The situation becomes very complex when E and B fields in a plasma are not prescribed. It is complicated to follow the trajectory of each and every particle. The magnetohydrodynamic approach used in fluid mechanics works for plasmas also. This approach neglects the
identity of the individual particle in a plasma and they are treated as a single fluid element. This
approach is useful to study low-frequency wave phenomena in highly conducting fluids.
Multi fluid theory: In the multi-fluid approach, different particle species (electrons, protons, heavier ions etc.,) are considered to behave like a separate fluid. This method is similar to fluid theory
and is useful to find the differences between lighter and heavier fluid behaviours. When these effects are taken into account it leads to charge separating fields and high-frequency wave generation.
This method is sufficiently accurate to describe most of the observed phenomena.
Kinetic theory: The velocity distribution of each species is assumed to be Maxwellian in the fluid
approach. However, in the plasma situations where the fluid approximation is inadequate, the
velocity distribution function of each species needs to be considered. Kinetic theory treatment
provides the velocity distribution function and the correlations between particles and fields for
each species. Vlasov equation is the simplest form of kinetic equation in a collisionless plasma.
1.3
Governing equations in plasmas
In this section, we present the governing equations that are commonly used for the description of
the wave phenomena observed in plasmas.
1.3.1
Continuity equation
A continuity equation is concerned with the conservation of matter, which requires that the number
of particles N in a volume V can change only if there is a net flux of particles across the surface
S bounding that volume. The continuity equation is also known as zeroth moment equation. The
general form of the continuity equation is
n
+ (nu) = 0
t
(1.1)
where n is the number density of the particle, u is thermal velocity, and the above equation represents conservation of particles. It states that a change of number density of particles inside a
volume is a consequence of the flow of particles into or out of the volume. Source or sink terms on
the right-hand side of Eq. 1.1 would represent ionization or recombination processes taking place
in a plasma.
1.3.2
Equation of motion and Maxwells equations
Equation of motion describes the motion of each individual particle in a plasma system. In fluid
approach, the motion of individual particle is no longer considered but the motion of fluid element
is taken as a whole. The equation of motion for a single particle of species j in an electromagnetic
field can be written as,
mj
dvj
= qj (E + vj B)
dt
(1.2)
along with the Maxwell equations,

.D = 4
(1.3)
.B = 0
(1.4)
1 B
c t
4
1 D
H=
J+
c
c t
E=
(1.5)
(1.6)
and the total current density is expressed as,

J = E
(1.7)
D = E
(1.8)
B = H
(1.9)
and
where , and are the plasma conductivity, permittivity and susceptibility, respectively. The
momentum equation described by Eq. (1.2) does not consider sources and sinks arising from
ionization or recombination. Further, this equation does not consider momentum transport due to
Coulomb collisions between charged particles. However, addition of these forces will give the full
equation of motion or momentum balance.
1.3.3
Equation of state
Thermodynamic equation of state relates the scalar pressure p and the density . The temperature
changes during the motion of a gas is well described by this relation and is used to close the system
of equations. For an ideal gas, the equation of state can be written as,
p = c
(1.10)
where c is a constant and is the ratio of specific heats Cp /Cv . For an ideal gas, equals (N+2)/N,
where N is the number of degrees of freedom. For a three-dimensional ideal gas consisting of
atoms, is 5/3.
1.4
Waves in plasmas
A large number of waves can be generated in plasmas. Depending on the plasma approximation,
the properties of various plasma waves can be studied. Any specific wave type can be related
to one of the discrete modes of plasma by examining its dispersion relation. For example, if we
consider, isotropic, unmagnetized plasma consisting of equal number of ions and electrons. If we
consider ions to be fixed in the background due to their heavier mass and electrons are allowed to
oscillate in thermal plasmas, it will give rise to electron plasma waves. Such waves are of very long
wavelength and are known as Langmuir waves. If we include the ion effects, low frequency waves
can be studied through ion acoustic waves. In addition, if we introduce magnetic field effects, it
will lead to a variety of plasma modes, such as, Alfven waves, magnetosonic waves, whistlers etc.
The conditions under which certain types of waves can exist should be considered and hence
the simple classification in transverse and longitudinal waves becomes insufficient. To start, let
us consider a sinusoidal wave propagating through a continuous medium, with a certain speed,
amplitude and frequency, leading to a periodic motion of the fluid represented as follows:
n=n
exp[i(k r t)]
(1.11)
The phase and group velocity of the wave can be determined from this representation
k
k2
=
k
vph =
(1.12)
vgh
(1.13)
The phase velocity of the wave shows the direction of wave propagation, the wave moves to the
right if /k is positive; for negative /k it moves to the left. The group velocity regards to
the modulated signal which carries the information, given by the slope of the dispersion relation.
This thesis mainly focuses on study of linear and nonlinear low (ion-acoustic) and high (electronacoustic) frequency waves in unmagnetized and magnetized space plasmas. Here, we introduce
few of the plasma waves.
1.4.1
Electron plasma wave
Consider a plasma with equal number of electrons and ions. Let us consider the situation where,
ions are fixed in the background and electrons are displaced from their original position. The
10
inertia of the electrons will cause them to oscillate about their mean position with a characteristic
frequency known as plasma frequency. An expression for electron plasma waves can be derived
by assuming that there is no fluctuating magnetic field, so that the waves are purely electrostatic
oscillation. The electron equations of motion and continuity reads as,
"
mne
ve
+ (ve .) ve = ene E
t
(1.14)
ne
+ . (ne ve ) = 0
(1.15)
t
where m, ne , ve and E are the mass, number density and velocity of the electrons and electric field,
respectively. The above set of equations are coupled through Poissons equation as given below,
.E = E/x = 4e (ni ne ) = 0
(1.16)
By linearizing the above equations and neglecting the higher order amplitude factor, the above
equations can be solved to give the plasma frequency as follows,
s
pe =
4ne e2
me
(1.17)
The group velocity of the plasma oscillations equals zero and the disturbance does not propagate.
The thermal motion of the electrons can carry the information and it can be derived by adding the
pressure gradient force p to the equation of motion. The dispersion relation for such electron
plasma wave (also known as Langmuir waves) in one dimensional case reads [Chen, 1974]
3
2
2
2 = pe
+ k 2 vth
2
(1.18)
2
where, the thermal velocity vth
= 2KT /m. This equation is based on the assumption that a local
Maxwellian equilibrium is always established, which requires frequent collisions to occur. In space
plasma situations, collisions are not frequent and the correct dispersion relation shown from kinetic
theory is [Kallenrode, 2000],
2
2
2 = pe
+ 3k 2 vth
(1.19)
This equation is derived by D. Bhom and E. Gross in 1949 and is called the Bohm-Gross equation.
From the equation (1.19), the group velocity of plasma waves can be determined as,
vg =
d
3k 2
3v 2
=
vth = th
dk
vph
(1.20)
11
Note that, group velocity is always lesser than the thermal velocity and much smaller than the
speed of the light (3kvth / < 1). Group velocity vanishes when thermal velocities approach to
zero.
1.4.2
Ion acoustic wave
So far, we have considered only the very-high frequency electron oscillations and have assumed
ions at rest. However, at lower frequencies, ions can still transmit vibrations to each other because
of their motion. The properties of the wave change due to the motion of ions. The inertia of the ions
results in slow oscillations of waves and hence these waves are referred as low-frequency waves.
The sound waves in ordinary fluids are the counterpart of the ion acoustic wave. Considering the
motion of both electrons and ions and assuming quasi-neutrality, the dispersion relation can be
derived as [Baumjohann and Treumann, 1996]
e KTe
=
k
mi

1/2
= vs
(1.21)
with vs being the ion-acoustic speed. There are significant differences between the dispersion relation for electron plasma waves and ion acoustic waves. The group velocity of ion acoustic waves
equal to the phase velocity and exists only when there are thermal motions of charged particles,
whereas, electron plasma waves are waves with nearly a constant frequency with a small correction
due to electron thermal motion. In the electron plasma wave, the electrons oscillate while the ions
stay fixed. In the ion acoustic wave, the ions also oscillate, overcoming their large inertia due to
the restoring force provided by the electron pressure. In space plasmas, the superthermal particles
streaming upstream of planetary bow shock fronts are observed as ion acoustic waves.
1.4.3
Electron acoustic wave
In addition, to the electron plasma wave and ion-acoustic wave, the electron acoustic wave are
important when plasma contains two or more electron components [Fried and Gould, 1961]. In
12
a two electron component plasma having hot Maxwellian electrons (denoted by the subscript h)
and other relatively cold (subscript c) and ions, the electron-acoustic waves can be generated. The
dispersion relation for electron-acoustic waves in such a plasma can be given by
2 =
2 h
i
(nc /nh )k 2 vth
2 2
1
+
3k
dc
1 + k 2 2dh
(1.22)
where nc , nh are the cold and hot electron densities respectively, dc(h) is cold (hot) electron

Debye lengths defined as dc(h) = KTc(h) /4nc,h e2
1/2
and vth is the hot electron thermal speed.
Gary and Tokar (1985) have analyzed electron-acoustic waves in details. They have found that
for electron-acoustic waves to propagate Th >> Tc is required. At Th = Tc , the acoustic regime

kcs (cs = nc/nh
1/2
vth is the electron-acoustic speed) at small k is heavily damped. As
Th /Tc is increased, a lightly damped cold plasma regime pc (pc is the cold electron plasma
frequency) is observed at intermediate wavenumber. At Th = 100Tc , electron-acoustic mode
becomes relatively lightly damped. The parameter regime in which the electron acoustic wave is
a normal mode of the plasma depends upon the relative densities and temperatures of the cold and
hot electron components.
1.5
Nonlinear methods
We have limited our attention exclusively to the linear phenomena so far, that is, to phenomena
describable by equations in which the dependent variable occurs to no higher than the first power.
This works as long as the wave amplitude is small enough that the linear equations are valid. However, there are several nonlinear phenomena observed in space plasmas leading to very different
types of behaviour. Shock waves, trapped particles etc., are some of the examples which exhibits
nonlinear effects. Here we consider basic nonlinear equations, which lead to the development of
strong turbulence. The basic idea is that strong turbulence consists of a large number of localized
wave solutions, called as solitons or also known as cavitons. The nonlinear equations associated
13
with the solitary potential solutions which are of relevance for space plasma physics is described
in the following section.
1.5.1
Korteweg-de Vries equation
The hydrodynamic approach is the simple way to treat the nonlinear waves. One-dimensional
nonlinear equation for wave in a medium supported by force, F, can be written as [Treumann and
Baumjohann, 1997]
v
v
+v
= F/m
t
x
(1.23)
v is the velocity of a fluid element. The left-hand side contains the convective derivative in a fluidlike medium. A large number of wave-wave interaction terms are obtained, when the nonlinear
term in the convective derivative is expanded into Fourier series. The above equation may contain a
third-order derivative with respect to x, in the absence of dissipation in the medium. The following
is the Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equation obtained from Eq. (1.23),
v
v
3v
+ Av
+B 3 =0
t
x
x
(1.24)
Here the coefficients A and B are constants. Using the transformation = x M t, where M is the
Mach number and direct substitution in Eq. (1.24) gives the solitary wave solutions of the form,
"
2
1 = 0 sech
(1.25)
with the relation between the amplitude, , of the pulse and its width
s
= 3M/A and =
2B
M
(1.26)
The solitary-wave solution of KdV equation shows that individual solitary waves survive collisions
and move at their constant speeds along its path without changing their shapes. KdV approach is
useful for describing the small amplitude nonlinear waves.
1.5.2
14
Pseudo-potential method
When two (or n) species collide with each other and maintain their identity, the set of nonlinear
equations describing such a plasma system is reduced to a single nonlinear equation describing the
behavior of the soliton solution analogous to an oscillator in a potential well. This was explained
by R. Z. Sagdeev (1966). For instance, the quasipotential V() in an idealized ion acoustic shock
wave can be written as,
"
2
V () = 1 e + M 1 1 2
M
!1/2 #
(1.27)
The electrostatic potential of the system described by quasi-potential is called the Sagdeev potential. Solutions of either the soliton type or the wave-train type exist only for a range of Mach
number, M. This Sagdeev pseudo - potential technique is extensively used in the analysis of multi
- fluid equations described in the other chapters of the thesis. This method is used for arbitrary
amplitude analysis of nonlinear waves such as solitons and double layers.
1.6
Velocity distribution functions
In magnetohydrodynamics, the particles are assumed to be in thermodynamic equilibrium and the

distribution function is Maxwellian. This distribution function allows fluid flow and different temperatures in the directions parallel to, and perpendicular to, the local magnetic field. However,
more complex distribution functions may also be used since plasmas are rarely in thermal equilibrium. Space plasmas are good examples of non-equilibrium state, therefore one can study variety
of plasma phenomena using non-thermal distributions. Thermal motions are essentially described
by distribution function which considers the positions and velocities of the individual particles.
The macroscopic phenomena then can be described using the statistical description of plasma by
averaging over a sufficiently large number of particles. In the following sub-sections, we describe
Maxwellian as well as nonthermal particle distributions commonly observed in space plasmas.
1.6.1
15
Maxwellian distribution
For a collisional plasma, the general equilibrium velocity distribution function is Maxwellian. A
Maxwellian plasma is in thermal equilibrium and does not have a free energy to derive any plasma
wave instability. A gas in thermal equilibrium described by one dimensional Maxwellian distribution is,
1
f (v) = A exp mv 2 /KT
2

(1.28)
where f is the number of particles per cm3 , v is the velocity, and K is Boltzmanns constant. The
constant A is,

A = n
m
2KT
(1.29)
The number density can be obtained by integrating over the distribution function,
n=
f (v) dv
(1.30)
In the presence of a non-zero potential, the distribution of electron species can be found by replac
ing
v2
2
vth
by
v2
2
vth
e
2 KT
, or,
v2
v2
e
=
+
2
2
2vth
2vth KT
(1.31)
The integral of Eq. (1.28) can be written as,

n=
n
q
2
2vth
v 2
e
exp
+
2
2vth KT
(1.32)
simplifying the above equation and integrating it using,

Z
ax2
gives the number density of electron species given as,

e
n = n exp
KT
(1.33)
It has to be noted that different species in a plasma can have different temperature at the same time.
It can be described by considering separate Maxwellian distributions with different temperature for
16
each species. For example, Gary and Tokar (1985) developed a linear theory based on electronacoustic solitons in order to explain the high frequency part of the broadband electrostatic noise
(BEN) spectrum. Dubouloz et al. (1991, 1993) have used the electron acoustic structures to explain
the space observation made by Viking satellite in day side auroral zone. The characteristics of
arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic solitons in a two electron component plasma is studied by
Mace et al. (1991). They have discussed some of the applications of the theory of large amplitude
electron-acoustic solitons to cusp auroral hiss. Verheest et al. (2005, 2007) have shown positive
potential solitary structures by including the hot electron inertia. All these studies have used the
Maxwellian velocity distribution function in their analysis.
1.6.2
Non-thermal distribution
Several observations shows that the plasma is not in equilibrium and their particle distributions
cannot be described by a Maxwellian. In that case, normally the non -thermal distribution functions
other than Maxwellian can give good approximations for such observations. Cairns et al. (1995)
used non-thermal electron distribution functions to describe the ion-acoustic solitary structures
described by the FREJA satellite. This non -thermal distribution is related to the electrons is given
by,

1+
v 4
4
vth
f (v) = q
2
1 + 3
2vth
v2
exp 2
2vth
(1.34)
Integrating the above equation, the number density of electron species can be written as,
h
nh = n exp() 1 + 2
(1.35)
where is a parameter which determines the population of non-thermal electrons and = 4/(1+
3). There have been several studies reported on electron and ion-acoustic waves using nonthermal distribution function. Bandyopadhyay and Das (1999) studied the stability of ion-acoustic
waves in a magnetized plasma composed of non-thermal electrons and warm adiabatic ions. The
effect of non-thermal electrons on solitary waves and double layers in a plasma consisting of warm
17
positive and negative ions is studied by Gill et al. (2004) using KdV and m-KdV theory. The
presence of non-thermal component alters the parametric region of Maxwellian solitons. Singh
and Lakhina (2004) has used non-thermal distribution for energetic electrons in two electron component model and found negative potential solitary structures. The fully nonlinear ion-acoustic
solitary waves in a plasma with two distinct ion species and non-thermal electrons is studied by
Sabry et al. (2009) and reported the solitary excitations of these waves and its dependence on mass
and density ratios of ion species.
1.6.3
Kappa distribution
Acceleration by Langmuir waves is an important process which produce superthermal particles.

The acceleration of particles in the Maxwellian tail is the dominant process and it tries to remove
particles from tail by further accelerating them to higher energies. In the lower energy range but
still above the thermal energy, the Maxwellian is depleted through the removal of higher energy
particles. Thus, at very higher energies the particle distribution can be fitted by a power law known
as kappa distribution. Kappa distributions have been used to study such superthermal particles,
which describes Maxwellian-like core and a high-energy tail component of power-law form. The
isotropic one dimensional kappa distribution function as given by Thorne and Summers (1991),
v2

f (v) = 3
1+ 2
2 3 12
n
()
!(+1)
(1.36)
Here is a parameter that represents the spectral index of the distribution (defined for > 3/2),
is the modified thermal speed, and () is the gamma function. The den2 = (2 3/) KT
m
sity expression for the hot electron species based on the distribution function is obtained by
integrating the Eq. (1.36),
"
n = n
#+ 1
2
3
2
(1.37)
Low values of are associated with more superthermal particles in the distribution tail, whereas at
the limit , the Maxwellian distribution is obtained.
18
Vasyliunas (1968) was the first to use kappa distribution function as a model to fit OGO-1 and
OGO-3 solar wind data as an empirical fit. Since then kappa distribution have successfully used
by several authors to explain the space observations involving superthermal particles. The study of
superthermal electron and ion-acoustic waves is important to understand the space plasma observations.
1.7
Scope of the thesis
Several theoretical studies have been done on Electron Acoustic Waves (EAWs) and Ion Acoustic Waves (IAWs) [Cairns et al, 1995; Dubouloz et al, 1991, 1993; Gill et al, 2004; Lakhina et al,
2008a,b; Mace et al, 1991; Singh et al, 2001; Verheest et al, 2012]. They have been observed in several space plasma situations such as, the bow shock, magnetosheath, magnetopause, auroral field
lines, Cusp and high-latitude polar magnetosphere, plasma sheet boundary layer, etc., [Bale et al,
1998; Cattell et al, 1999; Ergun et al, 1998; Franz et al, 1998; Matsumoto et al, 1994; Pickett et al,
2003; Temerin et al, 1982; Tsurutani et al, 1998]. All the above studies involving electron acoustic
and ion acoustic waves features Maxwellian and non-thermal distribution function (Cairns type
distribution). However, space plasmas often indicate the presence of superthermal electron and ion
distributions. There are only few studies, which have reported on electron-acoustic solitons using
superthermal particle distribution. Younsi and Tribeche (2010) have studied the electron acoustic
solitons in a three component unmagnetized plasma with hot superthermal electrons. The double
layer solution for unmagnetized three component model by Sahu et al. (2010) is found in the small
amplitude limit. However, thermal effects of hot electrons are not included in the study by Younsi
and Tribeche (2010) and Sahu et al. (2010). The effect of superthermality on ion-acoustic solitary
structures has been studied by Chuang and Hau (2009) in small amplitude limits. The characteristics of existence of ion-acoustic solitons in two and four component plasmas has been studied by
Saini et al. (2009) and Saini and Kourakis (2010). Recently, Sultana et al. (2010) have studied the
magnetized ion-acoustic solitary waves in a two component plasma but did not include temperature
effects.
19
This thesis examines the propagation of linear and nonlinear electron-acoustic and ion-acoustic
waves in superthermal unmagnetized and magnetized plasmas with kappa distribution function for
ions and electrons. The finite temperature effects and beam effects on such solitons are investigated
in detail. In the following sections, chapter wise summary of the work carried out in the thesis is
presented.
Chapter 2
In chapter 2, an unmagnetized three component model of Younsi and Tribeche (2010) is extended
to study the electron acoustic solitary structures (EAS) by including the finite temperature effects.
Linear dispersion relation for electron acoustic waves is derived. Sagdeev pseudo-potential technique is used to carry out the nonlinear analysis. The parametric regime for the electron acoustic
waves are obtained for this model and compared with the observations of day-side auroral region
made by Viking satellite. Satellite observations in different region of the Earths magnetosphere
are generally associated with electron and/or ion beams. So, the three component model of unmagnetized plasma is further extended to include an electron beam. It is found that, the inclusion
of beam alters the regime for solitons to exist compared with the three component model.
Chapter 3
Electron acoustic waves usually exist in a two-electron component plasma. However, electron
acoustic waves can also exist in a pure electron-ion magnetized plasma where ion temperature is
much hotter than the electron temperature (ie. Ti >> Te ). The chapter 3 discusses the obliquely
propagating electron acoustic waves in a magnetoplasma consisting of electron and ion in which
ion temperature is much higher than the electron temperature.
This work is further extended to study the multi-component electron acoustic waves in a magnetized plasma consisting of cold electron, hot electron, electron beam and ions in a small amplitude
limit. Further, effect of superthermality, beam velocity, temperature and obliquity on the solitary
wave amplitudes is examined in detail.
20
Chapter 4
There are few studies addressed the problem of ion - acoustic solitary waves in magnetized plasmas
with kappa distribution of electrons. Recently Sultana et al. (2010) studied the ion - acoustic
solitary waves in an magnetized plasma consisting of ions and kappa distributed electrons. In
chapter 4, the two component model of ion - acoustic waves consisting of warm ions and cool
electrons with inclusion of finite ion temperature is discussed.
Chapter 5
The final chapter comprises the summary of work done during the course of the thesis. It also
presents scope for the future work.
Chapter 2
Electron acoustic waves in unmagnetized
plasmas
2.1
Introduction
An electron-acoustic wave (EA) can exist in a electron-ion plasma provided ion temperature is
larger than the electron temperature which is difficult to realize in real situations. Ideally electronacoustic waves occur in three-component plasmas consisting of ions and two electron populations:
one cold and the other hot. It is basically an acoustic wave for which the inertia is provided by the
cold electrons, while the restoring force comes from the pressure of hot electrons [Wantanabe and
Taniuti, 1977].
These high frequency waves are very useful in understanding the broadband electrostatic noise
(BEN) observed in different regions of the Earths magnetosphere by various satellites, e.g. Viking,
FAST etc. [Cattell et al, 1998; Dubouloz et al, 1991, 1993; Ergun et al, 1999; Miyake et al, 2000;
Pottelette et al, 1999]. Analysis of the high time resolution of the plasma wave data from GEOTAIL
have shown that BEN in the plasma sheet boundary layer actually consists of short electrostatic
solitary waves (ESWs) whose Fourier spectrum give rises to the broadband nature of the noise
21
CHAPTER 2. Electron acoustic waves in unmagnetized plasmas
22
(Matsumoto et al., 1994). These ESWs are ubiquitous in space plasmas and are observed in the
solar wind, magnetosheath, Earths magnetosphere, plasma sheet boundary layer, magnetotail,
bow shock, magnetopause, auroral field lines, cusp, high-latitude polar magnetosphere and in the
distant magnetotail etc. [Bale et al, 1998; Bostrom et al, 1988; Bounds et al, 1999; Cattell et al,
1999; Ergun et al, 1998; Gurnett et al, 1976, 1979; Kojima et al, 1997; Lin et al, 1986; Marsch,
1985; Matsumoto et al, 1994; Mozer et al, 1997]. The electric field component of these bipolar or
tripolar electrostatic waves are parallel to the background magnetic field with bipolar or tripolar
pulses. The amplitude of these solitary waveform structures varies from a few V m1 in the
plasma sheet boundary layer to 2.5 V m1 in the auroral acceleration region [Ergun et al, 1998].
Several theoretical efforts have been made to model the electron acoustic solitary waves in multicomponent space plasmas to explain the part of the BEN emissions observed in the different regions of the Earths magnetosphere. Gary and Tokar (1985) developed a linear theory based on
electron-acoustic waves in order to explain the high frequency part of the BEN spectrum. Dubouloz
et al. [1991, 1993] have modelled the electron acoustic structures to explain the space observation
made by Viking satellite in the dayside auroral zone. The characteristics of the arbitrary amplitude
electron acoustic solitons in a two electron component plasma is studied by Mace et al. [1991].
They have discussed some of the applications of the theory of large amplitude electron-acoustic
solitons to cusp auroral hiss. Positive polarity electron-acoustic soliton structures have been studied by Berthomier et al. (2000, 2003) which were observed in the auroral plasma by the FAST and
POLAR spacecraft. Singh et al. (2001) studied electron acoustic solitons in four-component plasmas and applied their results to Viking satellite observations in the dayside auroral zone. Moolla
et al. (2007) have done a parametric study of high-frequency electrostatic oscillations in a threecomponent magnetized plasma. Verheest et al. (2005, 2007) have shown positive potential solitary
structures in electron acoustic waves by including the hot electron inertia. Kakad et al. (2007)
studied electron acoustic solitons in a four component unmagnetized plasma with a cold electron
beam and hot ions, and found both the rarefactive and compressive solitons for specific plasma
parameters and the coexistence of rarefactive and compressive electron acoustic solitary modes.
23
Lakhina et al. (2008a, 2008b, 2009) described a general analysis for studying ion and electronacoustic soliton in multicomponent plasma and applied their results to the Earths plasma sheet
boundary layer and the magnetosheath region.
The effect of nonthermal electron distribution was studied on ion-acoustic soiltary structures observed by the FREJA satellite by Cairns et al. (1995). The presence of non-thermal component
alters the parametric region for the existence of solitons. Singh and Lakhina (2004) and Singh et al
(2011) used non-thermal (Cairns type) distribution for energetic electrons in two and three electron component models and found negative as well as positive potential electron-acoustic solitary
structures. All the above studies on solitary wave models are based on the Boltzmann distribution
or non-thermal(Cairns type) distribution function for electrons/ions. However, in space plasmas,
the distribution function is often observed to deviate from the Maxwellian/ non-thermal due to
the presence of superthermal populations [Antonova and Ermakova, 2008; Christon et al, 1991;
Gloeckler et al, 1992; Gosling et al, 1989]. These superthermal particles are well modelled by
velocity distribution function which has Maxwellian-like core and a high energetic tail component of power-law form. Vasyliunas (1968) was the first to use kappa distribution function as an
empirical model to fit solar wind data from OGO-1 and OGO-3 satellites. Since then kappa distribution has been successfully used by several authors to explain the space observations involving
superthermal particles to examine the effect of superthermal distributions on linear and nonlinear
structures in electron-, ion- and dust-acoustic regimes.
In this chapter electron-acoustic waves are studied in three and four component unmagnetized
plasmas. The hot electron component is taken to be having kappa distribution. In the sections 2.2
and 2.3, electron-acoustic waves in three and four component unmagnetized plasma are presented,
respectively. The results are concluded in the section 2.4.
2.2
24
Electron acoustic waves in three component plasma
There have been only few studies on electron-acoustic solitons using superthermal particle distribution. For example, Younsi and Tribeche (2010) have studied the electron acoustic solitons
in a three component unmagnetized plasma with hot superthermal electrons. The double layer
solution for unmagnetized three component model by Sahu et al. (2010) is found in the small amplitude limit. However, thermal effects of hot electrons are not included in the study by Younsi and
Tribeche (2010) and Sahu et al. (2010). The existence and stability of electron-acoustic envelope
excitations and the associated modulational instability of electrostatic wavepackets in the presence
of excess superthermal electrons is studied by Sultana et al. (2011).
In this section, electron-acoustic waves are studied in three-component warm unmagnetized plasmas. In the following subsections theoretical model is discussed, then the linear and nonlinear
analysis of electron acoustic solitons in three component model with the numerical results are
presented.
2.2.1
Theoretical model
We consider a three-component, homogeneous, unmagnetized plasma comprising of hot electrons,

cold electrons with finite temperature and fluid ions. The hot electrons are assumed to be following
the kappa-distribution function given by Thorne and Summers (1991),
v2
1+
fh (v) = 3
2
2 3 12
Nh
()
!(+1)
(2.1)
where Nh is the hot electron density, is a parameter representing the spectral index of the
distribution, 2 = (2 3/) [kB Th /me ] is a modified thermal speed with the spectral index >
3/2, Th and me represent the hot electron temperature and electron mass, respectively, ()is the
gamma function. In the limit , the kappa-distribution function given by Eq. (2.1) reduces
to a Maxwellian distribution. The distribution of electrons in the presence of non-zero potential
25
can be found by replacing (v 2 /2 ) by [(v 2 /2 ) (2e/m2 )], where is the electrostatic potential
and e is the electrostatic charge. The integration over the resulting distribution function gives the
following expression for the number density for hot electrons:
2e
1
m2
Nh = Nh
( 12 )
(2.2)
The dynamics of cold electrons and ions are assumed to be adiabatic and their dynamics are governed by the following fluid equations
the continuity equation
Nj
+
(Nj Vj ) = 0
T
X
(2.3)
the momentum equation

#
"
Vj
Pj
Vj
j Nj
+ Vj
= Zj eNj
T
X
X
X
(2.4)

d
Pj Nj = 0
dt
(2.5)
2
= 4e (Nh + Nc Ni )
X 2
(2.6)
the equation of state
and the Poisson equation
Here Nj , Vj and Pj are the density, fluid velocity and pressure of the jth species, where j= c, i
represent cold electrons and ions, respectively, Zj = 1 for electrons and ions, respectively, and
j = mj /me . Using the appropriate scaling quantities, the above set of equations (2.3) - (2.6) can
be written in normalized form as follows:
nj
+
(nj vj ) = 0
t
x
(2.7)
vj
vj
1 pj
Zj
+ vj
+
=0
t
x
j nj x
j x
(2.8)
26
pj
pj
vj
+ vj
+ 3pj
=0
t
x
x
(2.9)
2
= nc + nh ni
x2
(2.10)
We have normalized the densities by the total equilibrium electron (ion) density N = Nh +Nc =
Ni , velocities by the thermal velocity of hot electrons vth =
electron Debye length dh =
Th /me , lengths by the effective hot
Th /4N e2 , temperature by the hot electron temperature Th , time
1
by the inverse of the electron plasma frequency pe
=
me /4N e2 , the potential by Th /e and the
thermal pressure by N Th . The convective derivative and continuity equation is used to obtain the
equation (2.9). The normalized hot electron density can be written as,
"
nh = nh
2.2.2
1
3/2
#(1/2)
(2.11)
Linear dispersion relation
The linear dispersion relations is obtained by linearizing and solving the equations (2.2) - (2.6) and
is given by
1
1+ 2 2
k dh
2
2
1/2
2 pc 2 2 2 pi 2 2 = 0
3/2
3k vtc 3k vti
(2.12)
where pj = 4Nj e2 /mj and vtj = Tj /mj are the plasma frequency and thermal speed of the jth
species and Nj , Tj and mj are the equilibrium density, temperature and mass of the jth species,
respectively.
The above linear dispersion can be written as
h
2
4 2 3k 2 vtc
+ 3k 2 vti2 +
2 2
2
2
2 i
pc
+ pi
3k 2 vtc
pi + 3k 2 vti2 pc
2 2
+ 9k 4 vtc
vti +
=0
a
a
(2.13)
27
where
1
a=1+ 2 2
k dh
1/2
3/2
The dispersion relation given in the form of equation (2.13) is quadratic in 2 and can be simplified
to give two linear modes of the plasma, i.e. the electron-acoustic mode
"
2
2
k 2 vth
( 3/2) / ( 1/2) (Nc /Nh )

3Tc
+
2
2
1 + (( 3/2) / ( 1/2)) k dh
Th
(2.14)
and the ion-acoustic mode
"
2
k 2 c2s
(Ni /Nh ) (( 3/2) / ( 1/2))

Ti
+
Tc (3Tc /Th ) (Nc /Nh ) (( 3/2) / ( 1/2))
(2.15)
where cs = 3Tc /mi is the ion-acoustic speed defined with respect to cold electron temperature.
In the case of Nc = 0 and , the usual ion-acoustic mode in pure electron ion plasmas is
recovered. The equation (2.14) is the same as that of Hellberg et al (2010) and can be further
simplified in the limit
!
3/2 2 2
k dh 1
1/2
to give
"
2
2
k 2 vth
3Tc Nc 3/2
+
Th
Nh 1/2
(2.16)
The above linear dispersion equation is modified from the usual electron acoustic mode due to the
presence of superthermal electrons. For , the equation (2.16) gives the usual expression
for the electron-acoustic mode in Maxwellian plasmas. In next section, we will focus on electron
acoustic modes and present the nonlinear analysis.
2.2.3
28
Nonlinear analysis
The properties of arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic solitons are studied by transforming the set
of equations (2.7) - (2.10) in a stationary frame moving with velocity V, the phase velocity of the
wave, i.e. = (x M t), where M = V /vth is the Mach number. The transformed Eqs. (2.7) (2.10) can be written as
nj
+
(nj vj ) = 0
(2.17)
vj
1 pj
Zj
vj
+ vj
+
=0
j nj
j
(2.18)
pj
pj
vj
+ vj
+ 3pj
=0
(2.19)
2
= nc + nh ni
2
(2.20)
Assuming appropriate boundary conditions, = 0, nc,h nc,h , ni 1, vj 0 and pj pj =

nj Tj and d/d = 0 at , we obtain the densities of cold electrons and ions as follows:
(
1/2 )1/2

2
nc 2
2
2
nc =
M + 2 + 3Tc M + 2 + 3Tc 12M Tc
6Tc
ni = ni
i
6Ti
2 3Ti
M2
+
i
i
2 3Ti
M2
+
i
i
!2
1/2 )
12M 2 Ti
(2.21)
1/2
(2.22)
Substituting the Eqs. (2.21), (2.22) and (2.11) in Eq. (2.20) and using above mentioned boundary
conditions, we obtain the energy integral of the form:
1
2
d
d
!2
+ V (, M ) = 0
(2.23)
29
where
"
V (, M ) = nh
1 1
3/2
"
!(3/2) #
)1/2 #
q
M
2
+nc M
M + 3c + 2 + (M 2 + 3c + 2)2 12c M 2
2
"
(
)3/2 #
q
2
+nc c 1 2 2M 3 M 2 + 3c + 2 + (M 2 + 3c + 2) 12c M 2
2
"
M
3i 2
+i M M 2 +
+
i
i
2
2
v
u
u
t
3i 2
M2 +
i
i
!2
v
u
3i 2 u
3i 2
+ t M2 +
+i 1 2 2M 3 M 2 +
i
i
i
i
"
12i M 2
!2
)1/2 #
12i M 2
)3/2 #
(2.24)
is the pseudo-potential known as the Sagdeev potential and c = Tc /Th , i = Ti /Th , nc = Nc /N
and nh = Nh /N . In order to have soliton solutions, the Sagdeev potential V (, M ) must satisfy
the following conditions: V (, M ) = 0, dV (, M )/d = 0, and d2 V (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0;
V (, M ) = 0 at = m and V (, M ) < 0 when 0 <| |<| m |, where m is the maximum
electrostatic potential. It is seen that in Eq. (2.24), V (, M ) and its first derivative with respect
to vanish at = 0. The condition d2 V (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 is satisfied provided M > M ,
where M is the critical Mach number and statisfies the following equation:
nc
1
1/2
+
= nh
2
2
(M 3c ) i (M (3i /i ))
3/2
(2.25)
and the critical Mach number, M can be approximately given as

M
v
u
u nc
t
nh
3/2
+ 3c
1/2
(2.26)
where the contribution from ions has been neglected. However, in general, equation (2.25) yields
four roots but all the roots will not be physical. For numerical computations, only the real positive
roots of the critical Mach numbers will be considered. Electrostatic solitary potential structures
can exist for Mach number values higher than the critical Mach number (M ) given by Eq. (2.26).
30
Figure 2.1: Variation of the Sagdeev potential V (, M ) with for = 3, 4 and =

(Maxwellian) for nc = 0.4, nh = 0.6, c = Tc /Th = Ti /Th = i and Mach number M = 0.9.
2.2.4
Numerical results and discussion
Eq. (2.23) is numerically solved for a three component electron acoustic solitons having kappadistributed hot electrons, cold fluid electrons and fluid ions. Figure 2.1 shows the variation of the
Sagdeev potential V (, M ) with the normalized potential for the different spectral index = 3,
4 and = . The other chosen normalized parameters are: cold electron density nc = 0.4, hot
electron density nh = 0.6, cold electron to hot electron temperature ratio c = Tc /Th = 0.01 =
Ti /Th (=i ) and Mach number M = 0.9. i is defined as the ion to hot electron temperature ratio.
From this figure, it is seen that the amplitude of the electron-acoustic solitons decreases with an
increase in the spectral index . For the above fixed parameters, the soliton solution do not exist
beyond Tc /Th < 0.13 for = 3. Depending on the chosen parameters, there will be different limits
on the Tc /Th value beyond which a soliton solution may not exist. The variation of normalized
bipolar electric field amplitude, E with for the Mach number M = 0.8, 0.85 and 0.9 for = 3
is shown in Figure. 2.2 and the other parameters are same as used in Figure. 2.1. It is observed
31
Figure 2.2: Variation of the normalized Electric field E vs for Mach numbers M = 0.8, 0.85 and
0.9 for = 3. The other parameters are same as in Fig. 2.1.
that the electric field amplitude of the bipolar structure increases with an increase in Mach number.
The width of the soliton is found to decrease with an increase in Mach number.
Figure 2.3 shows the variation of the normalized electric potential, , with for the parameters
of Figure. 2.1 for different values of the hot electron density nh for = 3. The other parameters
are same as used in Figure. 2.1. The soliton amplitude of increases with the increase in the hot
electron density.
The unnormalized values of the electron acoustic soliton velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton
width (W) and pulse duration ( ) for various values of spectral index and Tc /Th = Ti /Th are
tabulated for comparison in Tables 2.1 and 2.2. The observational parameters of dayside auroral
region have been used for this purpose. From Table 2.1, it is clear that the soliton velocity, electric
field amplitude and width increases with increase in , but pulse duration decreases. Also, the
range of soliton velocities tends to increase with .
32
Figure 2.3: Variation of electrostatic potential profile for various values of hot electron density nh
for = 3. The other parameters are same as of Fig. 2.1.
Table 2.2 shows that the inclusion of cold electron temperature significantly reduces the regime
for the existence of the solitons. For instance, the maximum electric field amplitude for the case
of Tc /Th = 0 is about 3 V m1 , which reduces to 400 mV m1 for Tc /Th = 0.01. Similarly, the
range of soliton velocity, width and pulse duration decreases with increase in Tc /Th value. Thus,
the inclusion of cold electron temperature plays an important role to shrink the existence regime
of the solitons and it also reduces the soliton electric field amplitude.
The present study does not include the effects of an electron beam, which is often reported in the
spacecraft observations. The inclusion of beam effects may alter the existence regime of electron
acoustic solitons described here. In the next section, electron-acoustic waves are studied in fourcomponent warm unmagnetized plasmas.
33
Table 2.1: Variation of the electron acoustic soliton velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton width(W)
and pulse duration ( ) with respect to for nc = 0.4, nh = 0.6,, c = Tc /Th = 0.01 = Ti /Th = i
and auroral region parameters [Dubouloz et al, 1991, 1993]; hot electron temperature, Th = 250eV,
cold electron temperature, Tc = 2.5 eV = Ti (ion temperature), and total electron density N = 2.7
cm3 .
V (km s1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(m)
= W/V(s)
2.0
3336-4733
0.06-230
2383-193
714-41
3.0
4362-6552
0.18-411
2719-245
623-37.4
4.0
4733-7184
0.21-477
2792-265
590-36.9
5.0
4932-7510
0.35-512
2857-275
580-36.7
Table 2.2: Variation of the electron acoustic soliton velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton width(W)
and pulse duration ( ) with respect to c = Tc /Th (= Ti /Th = i ) for nc = 0.4, nh = 0.6, =3.0,
and auroral region parameters mentioned in the Table 2.1.
c = Tc /Th
V (km s1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(m)
= W/V(s)
0.00
4203-14028
0.086-3067
3176-201
756-14.3
0.01
4362-6552
0.18-411
2719-245
623-37.4
0.02
4514-6186
0.25-276
2230-277
494-44.7
0.04
4806-6033
0.46-173
1954-285
407-47.3
0.05
4945-6046
0.56-146
1735-288
351-47.6
2.3
34
Electron acoustic waves in four component plasma
Theoretical studies of electron acoustic waves have been reported by several authors in multi component space plasmas [Berthomier et al, 2000, 2003; Mace et al, 1991; Mace and Hellberg, 2001].
Singh and Lakhina (2001) studied electron-acoustic solitary waves in an unmagnetized four component plasma with Maxwellian hot electrons, fluid cold electrons, an electron beam and ions to
explain the broadband electrostatic noise (BEN) observations in the dayside auroral zone. Verheest et al (2005, 2007) have shown that the positive potential electron acoustic solitons can exist
with the inclusion of hot electron inertia. Co-existence of positive and negative potential solitary
structures were studied by Kakad et al. (2007, 2009) in multispecies, unmagnetized plasmas by
using reductive perturbation and pseudo-potential methods. Lakhina et al. (2008a, b) studied large
amplitude ion- and electron-acoustic solitary waves in four component plasma consisting of cold
background electrons and ions, a hot electron beam and a hot ion beam. Lakhina et al. (2009,
2011) proposed a model based on electron acoustic solitons and double layers in a four-component
plasma system consisting of core electrons, two counter streaming electron beams, and one type
of ions, to explain the electrostatic solitary waves observed by CLUSTER satellite in the magnetosheath region [Pickett et al, 2005]. Electron acoustic solitons involving non-thermal Cairns type
distribution function is discussed by several authors [El-Shewy, 2007; Gill et al, 2006; Singh and
Lakhina, 2004].
The above studies discussed here have considered hot electron-component in their model to follow
Maxwellian or non-thermal velocity distribution function. However, as already mentioned in the
section 2.1, the space plasma observations suggests that the distribution function often deviates
from the above velocity distributions in the presence of energetic superthermal particles [Armstrong et al, 1983; Leubner, 1982; Marsch et al, 1982; Vasyliunas, 1968]. These superthermal
particles are well described by velocity distribution function [Hellberg and Mace, 2002; Mace
and Hellberg, 1995; Summers and Thorne, 1991; Thorne and Summers, 1991].
Several satellite observations in different regions of the space plasmas have reported that the electron acoustic solitons are generally associated with electron and/or ion beams [Cattell et al, 1998;
35
Dubouloz et al, 1991, 1993]. There have been few studies which reported the electron acoustic
solitons with an electron beam using Maxwellian or non-thermal (Cairns type) distribution function. Small amplitude electron acoustic waves in a four component plasma with non-thermal hot
electrons is studied by Elwakil et al. (2007) to discuss the proper description of the relativistic electrons and energetic population on the nature of unmagnetized plasmas. The investigation of the
beam effects on non-thermal electron acoustic solitons in a four component unmagnetized plasma
is shown by Singh et al. (2011). They have shown both positive and negative potential/double
layers in their study.
So far no study has reported electron acoustic solitons in a four component plasma with superthermal electrons and electron beam. The inclusion of electron beam to two electron component electron acoustic wave model studied in the previous section will help in understanding effects of beam
parameters such as beam density, velocity, temperature etc. Here we study the arbitrary amplitude
electron acoustic waves in four-component unmagnetized plasma consisting of cold electrons, superthermal electrons, electron beam and ions.
2.3.1
Theoretical model
In this section, the four component model of unmagnetized electron acoustic solitons with cold
electrons, beam electrons, ions and hot superthermal electrons is considered. The normalized
equations are given by Eqs. (2.7) -(2.9), where the subscript j = c, b, i represents cold electrons,
beam electrons and ions, respectively. Other parameters and normalization conditions are same as
in the section (2.2.1) except that now total unnormalized electron density is N = Nc +Nh +Nb .
The equations (2.7) - (2.9) are coupled through the Poisson equation given as,
2
= nc + nh + nb ni
x2
(2.27)
Here nb represents the number density of beam electrons. The hot electros are modelled by the
36
standard kappa distribution function given by Eq. (2.1). The normalized number density for hot
electrons is given by Eq. 2.11
2.3.2
Linear dispersion relation
The linear dispersion relation for electron-acoustic waves can be obtained by linearizing Eqs. (2.2)(2.6) (including fluid equations for electron beam),
1
1+ 2 2
k dh
2
2
2
pb
pi
1/2
=0
2 pc 2 2
2
3/2
3k vtc ( kvb )2 3k 2 vtb
2 3k 2 vti2
(2.28)
where pj = 4Nj e2 /mj and vtj = Tj /mj are the plasma frequency and thermal speed of the jth
species respectively. Here, Nj , Tj and mj are the density, temperature and mass of the jth species.
The above equation can be simplified to give the following dispersion relation for electron acoustic
waves by assuming electron beam drift speed vb = 0, and low beam temperature compared to hot
electron temperature (ie. Nh Tb /Nc Th << 1) and low beam density compared to cold electron
density (ie. Nb Tc /Nc Tb << 1) and neglecting ion effects reads as,
2
i
(Nc /Nh ) ( 3/2/ 1/2)
k 2 vth
Nb h
2 2
2 2
=
1
+
3k
+
1
+
3k
dc
db
1 + 2dh k 2 ( 3/2/ 1/2)
Nc
(2.29)
At Nb = 0, the dispersion relation (2.29) reduces to that of Mace et al. (1999). Further, in the limit
, this relation reduces to the dispersion relation of Singh et al. (2001). In the absence of
beam velocity, (i.e. vb = 0), this becomes the dispersion relation obtained by Berthomier et al.
(2000).
2.3.3
Nonlinear analysis
Using the transformation = x M t in the Eqs. (2.7) - (2.9) and (2.27) and applying boundary
conditions along with = 0, nc,h,b nc,h,b , ni 1, vj 0, pj pj = nj Tj and d/d = 0
37
at , the pseudo-energy equation can be written as,

1
2
d
d
!2
+ V (, M ) = 0
(2.30)
where
"
V (, M ) = nh
1 1
3/2
"
!(3/2) #
)1/2 #
q
M
2
2
+nc M M + 3c + 2 + (M 2 + 3c + 2)2 12c M 2
2
(
"
)3/2 #
q
2
2
3
2
2
+nc c 1 2 2M M + 3c + 2 + (M + 3c + 2) 12c M
"
+nb
r
(M vb )
(M vb )
(M vb )2 + 3b + 2
2
2
2
(M vb ) + 3b + 2
)1/2 #
2
12b (M vb )
+nb b 1 2 2 (M vb )3 (M vb )2 + 3b + 2
(
"
2
(M vb ) + 3b + 2
"
)3/2 #
12b (M vb )
M
3i 2
+i M M 2 +
+
i
i
2
2
v
u
u
t
M2
v
u
3i 2
+
i
i
!2
3i 2
3i 2 u
+i 1 2 2M 3 M 2 +
+ t M2 +
i
i
i
i
"
12i M 2
!2
)1/2 #
12i M 2
)3/2 #
(2.31)
where, M is the Mach number (defined as V /vth ), j = Tj /Th is the ratio of the temperature of the
jth species to hot electron temperature. In order to have soliton solutions, the Sagdeev potential
V (, M ) satisfies the following conditions: V (, M ) = 0, dV (, M )/d = 0, and d2 V (, M )/d2 <
0 at = 0; V (, M ) = 0at = m and V (, M ) < 0 when 0 <| |<| m |, where m is the maximum electrostatic potential. It is seen that in Eq. (2.31), V (, M ) and its first derivative with
respect to vanish at = 0. The condition d2 V (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 is satisfied provided
M > M , where M is the critical Mach number satisfies the following equation,
nc
nb
1/2
1
i+
+h
= nh
2
2
2
(M 3c )
i (M (3i /i ))
3/2
(M vb ) 3b
38
(2.32)
Eq. (2.32) yields 6 roots but all the roots will not be physical. For numerical computations only
the real positive roots for the critical Mach numbers will be considered. For the chosen parameters
for numerical computation, Eq. (2.32) yields three negative and three positive roots. Two of the
positive roots are very small (of the order of 103 and 101 ) and one root is of the order of unity.
We have taken the positive root which is closer to unity and describes the electron-acoustic mode.
The soliton solutions are obtained for subsonic hot electrons (ie. V< 2vth ; where 2vth is
the effective thermal velocity of the hot electrons in the limit ) and all other species are
supersonic (ie. V > vtc , vtb , vti ).
2.3.4
The numerical studies have been made using auroral region parameters from Dubouloz et al. (1991,
1993). The corresponding parameters are as follows: cold electron density nc = 0.2 cm3 , hot
electron density nh = 1.5 cm3 , beam electron density nb = 1.0 cm3 , and normalized beam
velocity v /vth = 0.1, cold electron to hot electron temperature ratio c = Tc /Th = 0.001 = Ti /Th
(=i ) and beam electron to hot electron temperature ratio, b = Tb /Th = 0.01. The observations
does not give the value of the spectral index . In this study, the typical value of = 4 has been
used for the hot electron component.
For the chosen parameters mentioned above, the inequalities used in Eq. (2.28) to obtain dispersion
relation (2.29) for electron-acoustic waves have the values Nh Tb /Nc Th = 0.075 and Nb Tc /Nc Tb
= 0.5. Since these values are below 1, our assumptions are very well satisfied and we are confident
that the mode we are studying is the electron-acoustic mode, possibly slightly modified by the
presence of the electron beam. Eqs. (2.30) and (2.31) are solved numerically to obtain electrostatic
potential () profiles and Sagdeev potential V(,M) respectively.
39
Figure 2.4: Variation of the Sagdeev potential V (, M ) with for various values of M for = 4,
nc = 0.2 cm3 , nh = 1.5 cm3 , nb = 1.0 cm3 ,vb /vth = 0.1, c = Tc /Th = Ti /Th = i = 0.001
and Ti /Th = 0.01 for Mach numbers M = 1.0, 1.1 and 1.2.
Figure 2.5: Variation of the normalized electric field amplitude (E) vs for the parameters of Fig.
2.4.
40
Figure 2.6: Variation of the soliton potential with for b = Tb /Th = 0.0, 0.05, 0.1 and Mach
number M = 1.1. Other parameters are same as Fig. 2.4.
2.6
41
Figure 2.8: Variation of the soliton potential with for vb = -0.1, 0.0, 0.1, 0.2 and 0.3 for Mach
number M = 1.1. Other parameters are same as Fig. 2.4.
2.8.
42
Figure 2.10: Variation of the soliton potential with for = 3.0, 4.0 and 8.0 and Mach number
M = 1.1. Other parameters are same as Fig. 2.4.
2.10.
43
Effect of the Mach number: Figure 2.4 shows the variation of Sagdeev potential V (, M ) with
normalized potential for different values of M for the parameters mentioned above. The maximum soliton potential is defined at the point where curves in the figure cuts the x-axis. For the
chosen parameters, soliton solution exists for the Mach number ranging from 0.88 < M < 1.28. It
is evident from the figure that increase in Mach number leads to a higher soliton amplitudes. The
corresponding bipolar normalized electric field (E) is plotted in Fig. 2.5.
Effect of beam temperature: The effect of beam temperature on solitary structures is shown in
Figure 2.6. Here the Mach number is fixed as M = 1.1 and other parameters are same as Fig. 2.4.
It clearly shows that the increase in beam temperature decreases the soliton amplitude. To obtain
soliton solution for the parameters described here, the beam temperature should be 0 < Tb /Th <
0.16. High electric field solitary amplitude is obtained for the case Tb /Th = 0.0 and is shown in
Fig. 2.7.
Effect of beam speed: In this study, the soliton solution is obtained for both positive and negative
values of vb . The complete range of vb to get soliton solution is -0.14 < vb < 0.33. The soliton
profile and the corresponding electric field profile is depicted in Fig. 2.8 and Fig. 2.9, respectively.
Our theoretical model predicts the higher soliton amplitude in the case of counter propagating
(V+vb ) electron beam than the co-propagating (V-vb ) electron beam. Our speculation is that this
trend could be due to the more free energy available for the case of counter propagating electron
beam than the co-propagating electron beam. However, width of the soliton is higher for copropagating electron beam case and it increases with the increase in electron beam speed.
Effect of superthermality: The nature of the electron acoustic solitary profile is significantly affected by the superthermality as seen from the Figure 2.10. For low values of , (ie. strong
superthermality), amplitude of the solitary structure is higher. Soliton amplitude decreases if the
superthermality decreases (ie. increase in ). Increasing the value of leads to the decrease in
soliton amplitude and attains a Maxwellian distribution at 30. Width of solitons increases with
the increase in values. Similar effects are reflected in the electric field profile plotted in Fig. 2.11.
The complete range of unnormalized values of soliton velocity, electric field, soliton width and
44
pulse duration are calculated to study the beam effects on electron acoustic solitary structures.
Tables 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5 shows the entire range of soliton characteristic values for various values
of , Tb /Th and vb respectively. The parameters are taken from an observed event in the dayside
auroral region [Dubouloz et al, 1991, 1993]. For this purpose we have calculated the range of Mach
numbers for which soliton solution exists. The lower limit of the Mach number is calculated from
the critical Mach number M by solving the Eq. (2.32) for the relevant parameters and the higher
limit is found numerically by solving the Sagdeev pseudo potential V (m , M ) =0 in Eq. (2.31) for
various values of M > M (as shown in Fig. 2.4, for example). The maximum value of M, beyond
which soliton solution does not exist, is Mmax and the corresponding amplitude of the soliton is
m . Unnormalizing the Mach number gives us the soliton velocity. The energy Eq. (2.30) is solved
numerically by using the Eulers method to calculate the soliton electric field as shown in Tables
2.3 - 2.5. The width is calculated by using the method of full width at half maximum.
Table 2.3: Variation of the soliton velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton width(W) and pulse
duration ( ) with respect to for auroral zone parameters of Dubouloz et al (1991, 1993) are, nc
= 0.2 cm3 , nh = 1.5 cm3 , nb = 1.0 cm3 , c = Tc /Th = 0.001 = Ti /Th = i , b = Tb /Th =
0.01, vb = 0.1, Th = 250 ev, Tc = 2.5 eV = Ti .
V (km s1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(m)
= W/V(s)
3.0
5370-7823
2.6-479
1288-256
239-32.7
4.0
5834-8486
6.1-544
1159-280
198-32.9
5.0
6099-8884
9.9-595
944-293
154-32.9
The soliton electric field amplitude tend to increase for the increase in values and is clearly seen in
Table 2.3. On the other hand, width and pulse duration decrease with . Also, the range of soliton
velocities tends to increase with and the results are similar to Table 2.1 (three component model).
From Table 2.4, the maximum amplitude for Tb /Th = 0 is about 4 Vm1 which is higher value for
the auroral region of the Earths magnetosphere. The inclusion of finite temperature effects shows
the electric field amplitudes comparable with the observations. For e.g. say Tb /Th =0.01, the
45
duration ( ) with respect to b for auroral zone parameters of Dubouloz et al (1991, 1993) are, nc
= 0.2 cm3 , nh = 1.5 cm3 , nb = 1.0 cm3 , c = Tc /Th = 0.001 = Ti /Th = i , = 4, vb = 0.1,
Th = 250 ev, Tc = 2.5 eV = Ti .
b = Tb /Th
V (km s1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(m)
= W/V(s)
0.00
5635-17900
1.5-3788
1831-246
324-13.7
0.01
5834-8486
6.1-544
1159-280
198-32.9
0.05
6298-7558
6.5-193
944-324
149-42.8
0.10
6895-7691
10.6-111
744-359
107-46.6
0.15
7425-7955
12.4-72
600-369
80.8-46.3
duration ( ) with respect to vb /vth for auroral zone parameters of Dubouloz et al (1991, 1993)
are, nc = 0.2 cm3 , nh = 1.5 cm3 , nb = 1.0 cm3 , c = Tc /Th = 0.001 = Ti /Th = i ,
b = Tb /Th = 0.01, = 4, Th = 250 ev, Tc = 2.5 eV = Ti .
vb
V (km s1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(m)
= W/V(s)
-0.1
4641-7956
1.7-715
1559-263
336-33.1
0.0
5238-8088
4.7-595
1101-283
210-34.9
0.1
5834-8486
6.1-544
1159-280
198-32.9
0.3
7094-9613
8.5-518
1001-277
141-28.8
46
maximum electric field amplitude is about 544 mV m1 and it subsequently decreases with further
increase in Tb /Th value. Also, the range of soliton velocities and pulse duration decreases with
increased beam to hot electron temperature. Table 2.5 shows that the soliton velocities and pulse
duration decrease with the increase in vb values. The electric field amplitudes are higher for
counter propagating beam and it decreases subsequently for the co propagating electron beam.
2.4
Concluding remarks
In this chapter, we investigated the electrostatic solitary waves in unmagnetized three and four
component plasmas in the presence of superthermal hot electrons. Our conclusions are summarized
as follows:
We have included the thermal effects into our study (cf. sec: 2.2) of electron acoustic solitons in three component unmagnetized plasmas, which were missing in the theoretical threecomponent model of Younsi and Tribeche (2010) and found that, the inclusion of temperature
effects shrinks the existence regime of the solitons and reduces the electric field amplitude. The
presence of superthermal hot electrons makes soliton to have higher velocities in comparison with
the Maxwellian. It is observed that the increment of superthermal electron population (ie. decrease in the spectral index, ) give rises to increase in the soliton pulse duration ( ), and reduces
the range of soliton velocity (V), electric field (E) and soliton width (W), as is seen from table 2.1.
The inclusion of cold temperature significantly reduces regime for the existence of the solitons and
their electric field amplitudes with an increase in cold electron temperature and is shown in Table
2.2. For example, the maximum electric field amplitude of 3 Vm1 is obtained for Tc /Th = 0 (cf.
column 3, row 1 of table 2.2), whereas the electric field amplitude drastically reduces to about
140 mVm1 (cf. last row, column 3 of table 2.2). Further, there is more than 50% of reduction in
the maximum soliton velocity, width and pulse duration is achieved for the case of Tc /Th = 0.05 as
compared to Tc /Th = 0.0 case. Similarly, the ranges of soliton velocity, electric field, soliton width
and pulse duration decreases with an increase in the cold electron temperature.
47
To summarize, we pointed out the inclusion of cold electron temperature shrinks the existence
regime of the solitons, on the other hand, it reduces the soliton electric field amplitude. Our
theoretical investigation aims in explaining the characteristics of the solitary structures observed
by Viking. It is to be noted that the auroral plasma where Viking made the measurements is
strongly magnetized. However, parallel propagating electron-acoustic waves are not affected by
the presence of the background magnetic field. Hence, our theory should remain valid for solitary
structures propagating parallel to the magnetic field.
In the four component unmagnetized plasma model, the inclusion of electron beam significantly
modifies the regime for the existence of electron-acoustic solitons. For the auroral region parameters of Dubouloz et al (1991, 1993), namely, nc = 0.2 cm3 , nh = 1.5 cm3 , nb = 1.0 cm3 ,
c = Tc /Th = 0.001 = Ti /Th = i , b = Tb /Th = 0.01, M = 1.1 and = 4, the electric field
amplitude and width of solitons comes out to be (524-30) mVm1 and (329-729)m respectively
for electron beam speed (660-1990) kms1 (ie. vb = -0.1 - 0.3).
The inclusion of electron beam dynamics pushes the minimum and maximum Mach number to
higher side for which soliton solutions are obtained for various values of (cf. Table 2.3) as
compared to three component model (cf. Table 2.1). Similarly the effect of electron beam temperature is to lower the electric field amplitude, soliton velocities and pulse duration significantly
as is evident from Table 2.4. The electron beam speed exhibits similar behavior to electron beam
temperature and it is seen in Table 2.5. The range of kappa values also widens due to presence of
electron beam and minimum value of kappa for which soliton solutions are obtained are higher as
compared to three component model.
For the parameters discussed in this chapter, positive potential solitons are not found. This could
be arisen due to the restrictions on the plasma parameters (ie. we are using fixed densities of the
cold, hot and beam electrons from the observations made by the Viking satellite). However, the
possibility of positive polarity solitons cannot be ruled out and it may be obtained by relaxing kappa
distribution for the hot electrons and allows the hot electron inertia to be retained in the analysis
as suggested by Verheest et al. (2005, 2007) and subsequently shown by Lakhina et al. (2009,
48
2011). In multi-component plasmas, for positive polarity electron-acoustic solitons to occur, the
cold electron density should be of the order of or greater than hot electron density as has been seen
in the literture [Lakhina et al, 2008a]. In our case the hot electron density is much higher than the
cold electron density. Our results may be useful to explain the features of localized electrostatic
solitary waves with similar electric field amplitudes that have been observed by Ergun et al. (1999).
Chapter 3
Electron acoustic waves in magnetized
plasmas
3.1
Introduction
Electron acoustic waves can exist in a magnetized electron-ion plasma with ions hotter than electrons [Fried and Gould, 1961] and can propagate across the magnetic field. Such restrictive plasma
conditions have been observed in the various regions of the Earths magnetosphere, solar wind,
etc. and it can be realized in laboratory plasmas as well [Gurnett et al, 1976, 1979; Lin et al, 1986;
Marsch, 1985]. Linear properties of two component electron acoustic model in magnetized plasma
is reported by several authors [Arefev, 1970; Goedbloed et al, 1973; Lashmore-Davies and Martin,
1973; Mikhailovskii, 1974; Sharma et al, 1983]. Parametric excitation of electron acoustic waves
in a pure-two-component electron-ion plasma has been studied extensively [Rahman and Shukla,
1982; Saleem and Murtaza, 1986; Sharma and Yu, 1982; Sharma and Kumar, 1984; Sharma et al,
1984]. Mohan and Buti (1980) obtained a modified KdV equation for the electron acoustic waves
in a current carrying magnetized two component plasma model with ion temperature much greater
than the electron temperature. Buti et al. (1980) studied the exact nonlinear electron-acoustic
49
CHAPTER 3. Electron acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas
50
waves in a magnetized plasma by taking into account the exact electron and ion nonlinearities.
Goswami and Bujarbarua (1987) investigated the electron acoustic double layers in a multi component plasma with two ion species and cool background electrons. Mace and Hellberg (1993)
have studied the electron-acoustic and cyclotron-sound instabilities driven by hot-electron drift
and discussed their relevance to cusp auroral hiss and broadband electrostatic noise in the auroral magnetosphere. Sah and Goswami (1994) found the modified electron acoustic solitons and
double layer with relativistic drifting electrons and nondrifting thermal ions by using the reductive
perturbation method.
The nonlinear oblique propagation of electron acoustic solitons in magnetized plasma composed
of electron fluid, hot electron and stationary ions has been carried out by Mamun et al. (2002).
A parametric study of high-frequency electrostatic oscillations in a three-component magnetized
plasma consisting of hot electrons, cool electrons and ions has been done by Moolla et al. (2007).
The electron acoustic solitons have been studied in plasmas containing non-thermal hot electrons,
cold electrons and stationary ions by Elwakil et al. (2011). They have included higher order
nonlinearity in their analysis.
Previous studies on the electron-acoustic solitons in pure two-component plasma with Ti >> Te
have considered electrons as mobile and ions with Maxwellian distribution. However, as already
mentioned in the section 2.1, in space and astrophysical plasma environments superthermal particles which deviates from the Maxwellian have been observed. There have been few studies on
electron-acoustic waves in unmagnetized and magnetized plasmas using superthermal kappa distribution function. Mace et al. (1999) have studied electron-acoustic waves in a plasma with hot
suprathermal electrons, cool Maxwellian electrons and ions. They have described the characteristics of the power law tail on existence domain of the electron acoustic wave by the parameters of
hot-to-cool electron temperature ratio, and the spectral index, . Electron acoustic solitary waves
in a three component unmagnetized plasma consisting of fluid cold electrons, ions and hot electrons having kappa distribution have been studied by Younsi and Tribeche (2010). They did not
include the effect of cool electron temperature in their study. Thermal effects of cool electrons
51
were included in our analysis of electron-acoustic solitons described in section 2.2. We found that
inclusion of cool electron temperature shrinks the existence regime of the solitons, and electric
field amplitude decreases with an increase in cool electron temperature. Sultana and Kourakis
(2011) examined the modulational instability of electron-acoustic waves in three-component unmagnetized plasma with cool electrons, hot kappa-distributed electrons and ions. It was shown that
superthermality affects the characteristics of solitary envelope structures. Further, we have studied
electron acoustic solitons with superthermal electrons in an unmagnetized four-component beam
plasma in sec. 2.3. The results showed that inclusion of an electron beam alters the minimum value
of spectral index, and Mach number for which electron-acoustic solitons can exist. The features
of large amplitude electron acoustic solitons in a magnetized plasma on their dependence on various plasma parameters (superthermality parameter , cold electron concentration, propagation
direction) have been investigated by Sultana et al. (2012).
All the theoretical studies on electron-acoustic solitons with kappa distribution of electrons have
considered multi-component, unmagnetized plasma with the electron temperature being larger than
the ion temperature. So far none of the study on EA solitons considered magnetized plasma. As a
first step, we study the electron-acoustic solitons in a magnetized, pure two-component (electrons
and ions with Ti >> Te ) plasma with energetic hot ions having the superthermal distribution
and cool fluid electrons. Later, the study of nonlinear electron acoustic waves is extended to four
component magnetized plasmas with cold, hot and beam electrons and ions, thereby relaxing the
stringent condition that ion temperature should be greater than the electron temperature. In section
3.3, electron-acoustic waves are studied in a four-component magnetized plasmas.
3.2
3.2.1
52
Electron acoustic waves in an electron-ion magnetoplasma

Theoretical model
We consider a two component, magnetized collisionless plasma consisting of cold electron fluid
and kappa distributed singly charged (Z = 1) hot ions (charge qi =Ze). The cold electrons are
considered to be adiabatic and ambient magnetic field is taken to lie along the z-axis, i.e., B =
B z, where z is the unit vector along the z-axis. To simplify the analysis, the waves are considered
to be propagating in the x-z plane, so that there are no variations along y-axis (i.e., y
= 0). The
normalized governing equations for cold electrons are given by,

ne (ne vx ) (ne vz )
+
+
=0
t
x
z
(3.1)
ne
vx
+ vx
+ vz
vx =
3ne
vy
t
x
z
x
x
(3.2)
vy
+ vx
+ vz
vy = vx
t
x
z
(3.3)
vz
ne
+ vx
+ vz
vz =
3ne
t
x
z
z
z
(3.4)
where ne , v and are the density, velocity and electrostatic potential of the cold electron fluid
respectively, and = Te /Ti , is the electron to ion temperature ratio. In the equations (3.1)-(3.4) the
parameters have been normalized as follows: densities by equilibrium density N0 = N0e = N0i ,
eB0
temperature by ion temperature Ti , time by inverse of electron cyclotron frequency e = ( m
),
ec
velocities by cs =
Ti
,
me
Cs
lengths by effective electron Larmor radius
, potential by Tei and thermal
e
pressure by N0 Ti . Here =
(N +2)
,
N
and N is the number of degrees of freedom taken as one, hence
the adiabatic index = 3. One can have =5/3 by considering three degrees of freedom as has
53
been done by Mahmood and Akhtar (2008) to study ion-acoustic solitons in magnetized electronpositron-ion plasmas with adiabatic ions. However, this complicates the analysis. Since equation
of motion and continuity are treated exactly, we do not expect the results to change qualitatively
by taking =5/3 instead of =3.
To model the effects of hot superthermal ions, we follow the kappa-distribution function given by
Summers and Thorne (1991). The hot ions are assumed to follow the kappa distribution given as,
v2
1+
foi (v) = 3
2
2 3 12
N0i
()
!(+1)
(3.5)
where is the superthermality index, () is the gamma function and the modified thermal speed

3 KTi
. In order that the thermal speed to be physical (i.e., real)
is given by 2 = 2
mi
we require > 23 . The Maxwell-Boltzmann equilibrium is obtained in the limit . The
e
distribution of ions in the presence of non-zero potential can be found by replacing v 2 by v 2 +
Ti
in equation (3.5). The number density of ions can be obtained by integrating distribution function
foi given by equation (3.5) over velocity space. The ion number density (ni ) in the normalized
form can be written as,
#+ 1
"
ni = 1 +
3.2.2
(3.6)
3
2
Dispersion relation
The linear dispersion relation can be obtained from linearizing Eqs. (3.1)-(3.6) and making use of
the plasma approximation (ne ni ), this can be written in the form,
(
4
2e
k 2 c2s
3 +
3
2
1
2
!)
k 2 c2s 2e
cos 3 +
3
2
1
2
=0
(3.7)
At = 900 , i.e., cos = 0, the cyclotron mode modified by the thermal effects is obtained and
given as,
2
2e
k 2 c2s
3 +
3
2
1
2
(3.8)
54
and for = 00 , i.e., cos = 1, we get two modes,

2 = 2e
2
(3.9)
3 +
k 2 c2s
3
2
1
2
(3.10)
namely, Eq. (3.9) is the cyclotron mode and Eq. (3.10) is the electron-acoustic mode. Eq. (3.7) is
quadratic in 2 . After a short algebraic manipulation, this can be written in the form as,
"
1 2
=
e + k 2 c2s 3 +
2
v
u(
u
t
2
e
k 2 c2s
3
2
1
2
3 +
3
2
1
2
!)2
4k 2 c2s 2e
cos2
3 +
3
2
1
2
!#
(3.11)
Various wave types are identified by analyzing the Eq. (3.11) in the small and large wave number
regimes.
Case (i):Large wavelength limit: When
2e
>>
k 2 c2s
3 +
32
12
, the upper and lower frequency
modes of Eq. (3.11) reduces to
k 2 c2s
+ ' e +
sin2 3 +
2e
' kcs cos 3 +
3
2
1
2
Case (ii): Short wavelength limit: When 2e << k 2 c2s 3 +
3
2
1
2
(3.12)
!1
2
(3.13)
23
12
, the upper and lower frequen-
cies becomes,
+ ' kcs
3 +
' e cos
3
2
1
2
!1/2
(3.14)
(3.15)
55
Equations (3.12)-(3.15) are identical to the equation (12)-(15) of Mace and Hellberg (1993). It is
clear that, in the large wavelength limit, mode given in the Eq. (3.13) behaves like electronacoustic mode in a magnetized plasma, whereas Eq. (3.14) behaves like electron-acoustic wave in
unmagnetized plasma and is similar to the Eq. (3.10). In the limit 0 equations (3.10) and
(3.14) reduce to the usual electron-acoustic mode in a Maxwellian plasma. The modes described
in Eq. (3.12) and Eq. (3.15) are the cyclotron modes.
3.2.3
Nonlinear analysis
To study the existence of arbitrary amplitude nonlinear propagation of electron-acoustic waves, the
solution of Eqs. (3.1) - (3.6) has to be found. By assuming = x + z M t (where M is the
Mach number, , are the directions of cosines along x and z directions, i.e., =
kz
k
kx
k
= sin ; =
= cos ), the variables in the above equations are transformed to a single variable that depend
on x, z and t. Using the above transformation in Eq. (3.1) - (3.6), the fluid equations become,
M
ne
(ne vx )
(ne vz )
+
+
=0
(M + vx + vz )
(3.16)
vx
ne
+ 3ne
+ vy = 0
(3.17)
vy
vx = 0
(3.18)
vz
ne
+ 3ne
=0
(3.19)
(M + vx + vz )
(M + vx + vz )
After integrating equations (3.16) - (3.19) by considering quasi-neutrality condition (ne = ni = n)

and appropriate boundary conditions (ne,i 1, vx,z 0, 0 and d/d 0, at ),
thus gives
56
n (vx + vz ) = M (n 1)
(3.20)
!+ 3
vz =
1 + 1 +
M
+ n3 1
3
2
(3.21)
!+ 3

2

1
1
2
vx =
M 1
1 + 1 +
+ n3 1
n
M
32
(3.22)
Using equations (3.6), (3.22), and (3.21) in equation (3.20), a straightforward algebraic manipulation leads to
2
2
d2 Q
=
1
1
+
d 2
M2
M2
2
+ 2 1+
M
1+
!2+2
3
2
!+ 1
3
2
2
+ 2
M
1+
!4+2
(3.23)
3
2
where,
M2
Q =
1+
2
!21
3
2
Now, multiplying both sides of Eq. (3.23) by 2
dQ
d
1+
2
!2+1
3
2
(3.24)
and integrating by using the appropriate bound-
ary conditions, leads to the energy type integral for the electrostatic potential ,
1
2
d
d
!2
+ (, M ) = 0
(3.25)
where
(, M ) =
1 (, M )
,
2 (, M )
is the Sagdeev pseudo potential whereas

!
1 (, M ) =
1 + 2 1 1 +
M
!+3/2
3
2
(3.26)
!1/2
+(M 2 + 2 ) 1 1 +
!2+3
1 1+
2
2M
+ 2 1 1 +
!+3/2
3
2
3
2
2 (, M ) = 1 M
1
2
3
2
1+
!#
+ 1+
!21
!4+3
3
2
3
2
1+
2 3
+
1 1+
2
!3+3/2
1
2
3
2
!1/2
+ 1 + 2 1 1 +
M
M2
1 1+
2
3
2
+
1 1+
2
M
"
3
2
57
3
2
!22
3
2
3
2
!6+3 )
1
2
3
2
3
2
!2+1
1 1+
2
2M
+ 3
!3+3/2
1+
3
2
!2 2
3
2
Equation (3.25) is regarded as Sagdeev potential equation which must satisfy the following conditions: (, M )=0, d(, M )/d =0, d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0; (, M )=0 at = 0 , and
(, M ) <0 for 0 <| |<| 0 |. Eq. (3.26) shows that (, M ) and its first derivative with
respect to vanish at = 0.
It is worth mentioning here that Eq. (3.26) does not depend on the magnetic field,B0 , explicitly.
This is due to the normalization used here. However, if one uses the normalization similar to that
of Sultana et al. (2010), the Sagdeev potential term will have
(3.26), i.e., (, M ) (
2e
2
pe
2e
2
pe
as a multiplying factor in Eq.
)(, M ). Therefore, the critical mach number as well as maximum
normalized potential amplitude of the solitons will not be affected as found by Sultana et al. (2010).
When we do the unnormalization to obtain actual electric field amplitude, width and pulse duration
of the solitons, it is observed that electric field amplitude, pulse duration and width changes due to
the change in ratio of electron cyclotron frequency to the electron plasma frequency. Our results
exhibit similar behavior to the one obtained by Sultana et al. (2010) for ion-acoustic solitons in
magnetized plasmas with kappa distributed electrons.
58
From second derivative of the Eq. (3.26), the soliton condition d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 gives,
d2 ()
M 2 M02
<0
|
=
=0
d2
M 2 {M 2 M12 }
(3.27)
The condition d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 is fulfilled when M > M0 , here M0 is the critical Mach
number given by
M0 = 3 +
3
2
1
2
!1/2
(3.28)
and
M1 = 3 +
3
2
1
2
!1/2
(3.29)
For 6= 1, the value of M1 M0 , thus the soliton condition given by Eq. (3.27) is satisfied when
M0 < M < M1 for 6= 1. Where M0 is the critical Mach number and M1 is defined as the
upper limit of the Mach number. It is interesting to note that for = 1, inequality (3.27) cannot be
satisfied, hence no soliton solution is possible. For the fixed set of parameters, first critical Mach
number is obtained from Equation (3.28). From then onwards, Mach number is increased till the
soliton solution cease to exist. The highest Mach number for which soliton solution exists is the
upper limit of M. The upper limit of the Mach number derived by the soliton condition (i.e. Eq.
3.29) exactly matches with the numerical calculations obtained from Eq. (3.29).
3.2.4
For electron acoustic modes to exist in a two-component electron-ion plasma is that the hot species
(ions) should be subsonic (ion thermal velocity needs to be larger than phase speed of the wave, ie.
V < Vti ) and cold species (electrons) should be supersonic (electron thermal velocity needs to be
smaller than phase speed of the wave, ie. V > Vte ). This gives the condition for obliquity defined
from the Eq. (3.13) that, = cos <
me /mi / 3 +
32
12
1
2
The variation in M0 and M1 with are plotted for various values of obliquity () in fig. (3.1).
Mmin and Mmax corresponds to the left hand side and right hand side of the y-axis respectively.
59
Figure 3.1: Variation in the critical Mach number (solid line, L.H.S. y-axis)and maximum Mach
number (dashed line, R.H.S. y-axis) with for = 0.01, = 0.02 and = 0.03 at = 0.0.
60
Figure 3.2: Variation in the Sagdeev pseudo potential with for various values of Mach number
(M)for = 2.0, = 0.0 and = 0.02.
Figure 3.3: Variation of the normalized electric field amplitude (E) vs for various values of for
= 2.0, = 0.0 and M = 0.02.
61
M = 0.02, = 0.0 and = 0.02
M = 0.04, = 2.0 and = 0.04.
V (kms1 )
976-24315
985-24424
997-24638
1006-24743
0.001
0.002
0.004
0.005
1.12-155
0.75-166
0.44-199
0.17-234
E (mVm1 )
B0 = 10 nT
242-110
284-100
324-86
386-72
W(km)
240-4.4
286-4.0
328-3.4
394-3.0
= W/V(ms)
1006-24743
997-24638
985-24424
976-24315
V (kms1 )
2.24-310
1.50-332
0.88-398
0.34-468
E (mVm1 )
B0 = 20 nT
ion temperature Ti 10keV , = 0.04 and = 2.0, and two different values of magnetic field B0 .
121-55
142-50
162-43
193-36
W(km)
120-2.2
143-2.0
164-1.7
197-1.5
= W/V(ms)
Table 3.1: Variation of the soliton velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton width(W) and pulse duration ( ) with respect to for

62
63
The dependance of minimum mach number on given by Eq. (3.28) is clearly seen in the figure.
On the other hand, the maximum Mach number does not have any effect and is given by Eq. (3.29).
Figure 3.2 shows the variation of Sagdeev potential with normalized potential for various values
of Mach number. Other parameters are = 2.0, = 0.0 and = 0.02. The solitary wave amplitude
increases with increase of M and there are no solution existing beyond M = 0.5773.
Variation of normalized electric field vs for various values of is shown in figure 3.4. Here M =
0.02, = 0.0 and = 2.0. It is observed that the electric field amplitude increases with a decrease
in value, i.e., it increases with increase in angle of propagation, and soliton width becomes
narrower with the increased obliquity (less ). Figure 3.3 shows the variation of electric field vs
for various values of as shown on the curves. It is observed that soliton amplitude increases
with an increase in superthermality (decrease in values). We have also plotted the variation of
normalized electric field vs for various values of = Te /Ti as shown on the curves in figure 3.5
for = 2.0, M = 0.04 and = 0.04. It shows that the inclusion of temperature effects reduces the
electric field amplitude of the solitons.
The Wind spacecraft data observations reported by Bale et al. (1998) in the bow shock region
have solitary waves with period of 3.5 ms, and average electric field of 150mV /m, electron
temperature 20 40 eV and ambient magnetic field B0 10 nT . Table 3.1 shows the soliton
velocity (V), electric field (E), soliton width(W) and pulse duration ( = W/V ) for = 2.0,
= 0.04, ion temperature Ti = 10 keV[Gosling et al, 1978] and = Te /Ti = 0.001 0.005
for magnetic field B0 = 10 nT and 20 nT. The range of values given in columns 2 to 8 of table
3.1, correspond to the Mach numbers just above critical value, M0 (minimum) and at the upper
limit, M1 (maximum), respectively. It is obvious from the Table 3.1 that the range as well as the
maximum electric field amplitude of the solitary wave decreases with the increase in the values
and the corresponding pulse width increases. Also, the Mach numbers lying close to the upper
limit, the values of the maximum electric field amplitude ( 155 - 234 mV/m) (cf. column 3) and
minimum pulse duration ( 3 - 4.4 ms)(cf. column 5) are in good agreement with the observations
for all values of = 0.001 to 0.005. Further, the electric field amplitude increases with the increase
64
in magnetic field whereas soliton width as well as pulse duration decreases.

The present study has discussed electron acoustic waves in a magnetized plasma where ion temperature is much larger than electron temperature. However, most of the space observations belongs to
the category of usual two electron component model of electron acoustic solitons. Further, the inclusion of beam effects may alter the existence regime of electron acoustic waves. In next section,
electron-acoustic waves are studied in a four-component magnetized plasmas.
3.3
Electron acoustic waves in four component magnetoplasma
Plasmas having superthermal electron and/or ion component are ubiquitous in space and astrophysical environments. As already mentioned in section 2.1, several observations have reported
the presence of superthermal populations in the Earths magnetosphere, solar wind, auroral region
etc., Many authors have effectively used kappa velocity distribution function as a fit to real space
observations [Christon et al, 1988; Feldman et al, 1983; Pierrard and Lazar, 2010]. Recently, Li
and Cairns (2013) studied the type III bursts and associated beams in coronal plasmas with kappa
particle distributions. Their simulation results show that stronger electron acceleration is more
easily observable in kappa plasmas than Maxwellian.
Earlier studies on EAWs have used the Maxwellian or non-thermal velocity distribution function
of the particles. Mace et al., [Mace et al, 1991] studied the arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic
solitary waves in an unmagnetized plasma considering Boltzmann function for hot electron with
fluid cool electron and ion to explain the electrostatic fluctuations, referred as cusp auroral hiss.
Electron acoustic waves in an unmagnetized four-component plasma system consisting of two
types of (cold and beam) electrons and ions have been studied by Lakhina et al (2008b) to explain
the spacecraft observations in the Earths plasma sheet boundary layer. EAWs in an unmagnetized
plasma with cold electrons and two different temperature isothermal ions obeying Boltzmann type
distributions is studied by Kakad et al. (2009) to explain the compressive and rarefactive bipolar
electric fields of BEN type emission observed in the magnetospheric regions.
65
Singh and Lakhina (2004) studied EAWs with nonthermal distribution of hot electrons, cold electrons and ions and presented a simple 1-D model. They have extended their study by including
electron beam to investigate the effect of beam on electron acoustic solitary waves [Singh et al,
2011] and found both positive and negative potential/double layers. They have shown that, the
addition of warm electron component is necessary to obtain positive potential structures.
The effects of magnetic field on obliquely propagating electron acoustic waves in two electron
component magnetized plasma has been studied by Mamun et al. (2002) using vortex like distribution for hot electrons in their model. EAWs also exist in a two component electron-ion magnetized plasmas provided that the ion temperature is much larger than the electron temperature.
Such EAWs in a two component magnetized plasma is studied by Buti et al. (1980). Weakly nonlinear electron acoustic wave in a two electron component magnetized plasma is studied by Mace
and Hellberg (2001). They have derived the Korteweg-de Vries-Zakharov-Kuznetsov (KdV-ZK)
equation leading to plane and ellipsoidal soliton solutions to explain some of the two dimensional
features of solitary wave observations.
Effect of magnetic field on nonthermal EAWs consisting of non-thermal hot electrons, cold electrons and stationary ions have been studied by Elwakil et al. (2011). They have added the fifth
order dispersion term to the ZK equation to obtain higher order solution. It is found that the external magnetic field and obliquity alters the higher order amplitude of the electron acoustic solitons
significantly.
Observations in space plasma region show the presence of electron beams associated with electrostatic solitary waves. The influence of beam on electron acoustic solitons with three electron
populations consisting of Maxwellian electron beam in addition to the cold and hot population of
electron has been studied by Singh et al. (2001). They found that parametric regime of electron
acoustic waves strongly depend on the beam properties. Elwakil et al. (2007) has studied both the
relativistic effects and nonthermal effects of EAWs in a four component plasma with non thermal
hot electron, relativistic cold electron, electron beam and stationary ions. Ghosh et al. (2008) studied electron acoustic solitary waves in a magnetized plasma consisting of warm electrons, a warm
66
electron beam and two types of hot ions, and found that the characteristics and the existence domain of the positive potential electron-acoustic solitons are controlled by the ion temperature and
concentration. Four component magnetized plasma model consisting of core electrons, two types
of electron beam and ions is used to explain the electrostatic solitary waves in the magnetosheath
region [Lakhina et al, 2009].
Electron acoustic waves featuring superthermal distribution for electrons and/or ions shows better
approximations to the observations than Maxwellian or non-thermal distribution where high electric field amplitudes are observed. Occurrence of modulation instability (MI) in an unmagnetized
plasma is investigated in the presence of superthermal electrons, cold electrons and ions [Sultana
and Kourakis, 2011]. Arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic waves in a two electron component
magnetized, cold plasma are studied by Sultana et al. (2012) by assuming quasi neutrality condition. They have also derived the small amplitude limit by expanding the Sagdeev potential. Small
amplitude weakly nonlinear electron acoustic waves are studied by Javidan and Pakzad (2013)
in a three component magnetized plasma using slightly different distribution function for the hot
electrons from that of Sultana et al. (2012). The properties of the electron acoustic wave in a pure
electron-ion magnetized plasma where ion temperature is much hotter than electron temperature is
described in the previous section.
In this section, we study the electron acoustic solitary waves in a magnetized plasma consisting of
hot electrons featuring kappa distribution, fluid cold electrons, an electron beam and ions. Here we
extend the earlier work [Javidan and Pakzad, 2013; Sultana et al, 2012] by including an electron
beam and finite temperature effects for all the species in the model.
3.3.1
Theoretical model
A homogeneous, collisionless, magnetized plasma consisting of a cold electron fluid, an electron

beam, superthermal hot electrons obeying distribution function, and ion is considered. The
external magnetic field B0 is assumed to lie along the z-axis. The hot electron is considered to
67
obey the distribution function given by Thorne and Summers (1991) and the normalized number
density of hot electrons (nh ) is given by Eq. 2.11
The normalized fluid equations governing the dynamics of cold electrons, electron beam and ions
is given by
nj
+ (nj vj ) = 0
t
"
(3.30)
vj
j nj
+ (vj .) vj = Zj nj Pj Zj j nj j (vj z)
t
(3.31)
Pj
+ vj .Pj + 3Pj .vj = 0
t
(3.32)
2 = nc + nh + nb ni
(3.33)
where, the subscript j represents cold electrons (c), electron beam (b) and ion fluid (i). The adiabatic index = 3, j = mj /me is the mass ratio, Zj = 1 for electrons and ions, respectively, and j = cj /pe where cj =
eBo
mj c
is the cyclotron frequency of the j th species and
pe = (4No e2 /me )1/2 is the total electron plasma frequency. In the case of magnetized plasma,
three degrees of freedom is usually considered and will be taken as 5/3. However, in our analysis
we have treated the continuity and momentum equations exactly and taken the value of = 3 by
considering only one degree of freedom.
In the above equations the following normalization are considered: lengths (x,z) by Debye length
(Th /4No e2 )1/2 , velocities (v) by thermal velocity of hot electrons (Th /me )1/2 , time (t) by inverse
1
of plasma frequency pe
, electrostatic potential () by (Th /e), densities by equilibrium density
No = Noh + Nob + Noc = Noi and pressure (P) by (No Th ). According to the reductive perturbation
technique [Tagare et al, 2004], the stretched co-ordinates are introduced as:
= 1/2 x, = 1/2 y, = 1/2 (z V t), = 3/2 t
(3.34)
68
and expansions
nj = nj0 + nj1 + 2 nj2 + 3 nj3 + ...
Pj = Pj0 + Pj1 + 2 Pj2 + 3 Pj3 + ...
= 1 + 2 2 + 3 3 + ...
vjx = 3/2 vj1x + 2 vj2x + 5/2 vj3x + ...
vjy = 3/2 vj1y + 2 vj2y + 5/2 vj3y + ...
vjz = vj0 + vj1z + 2 vj2z + 3 vj3z + ...
(3.35)
where the is a small dimensionless parameter and V is the phase speed.
3.3.2
Dispersion relation
Substituting Eqs. (3.34) and (3.35) in Eqs. (3.30) - (3.33) provides the following dispersion relation
for the coefficients of lowest order of , we obtain,
Zj njo
i =0
nho p j h
j (V vjo )2 3Tj
(3.36)
with
p=
1/2
3/2
Eq. (3.36) gives a linear dispersion relation for electron-acoustic waves and it is similar to the
dispersion relation for electron-acoustic waves as in the case of unmagnetized plasmas (cf. Eq.
2.28). The effects of magnetic field is not appearing in the dispersion relation due to the expansion scheme used here. It must be emphasized here that in the three component, cold plasma limit
(neglecting the electron beam and finite temperatures of the species and considering ions as stationary) our dispersion relation reduces to Sultana et al. (2012) in a weakly magnetized plasma.
This model is suitable to explain electron acoustic waves in weakly magnetized plasmas.
3.3.3
69
Nonlinear analysis
From the second order equations in , the following KdV-ZK equation is obtained
1
1
3 1
+ a1
+b 3 +c
2 1 2 1
+
2
2
=0
(3.37)
where
a=
B
1
C
;b = ;c = ;
A
A
A
A = j h
(3.38)
2Zj2 njo j (V vjo )

j (V vjo )2 3Tj
(3.39)
i2
B = 2nho q j
C = 1 + j
where q =
(1/2)(+1/2)
.
2(3/2)2
3Zj3 njo j (V vjo )2 + Tj

h
j (V vjo )2 3Tj
(3.40)
i3
njo j (V vjo )4
h
2j j (V vjo )2 + Tj
(3.41)
i2
It is possible to solve the Eq. (3.37) by assuming the waves are propa-
gating in the x-z plane, therefore take
= 0 in the Z = cos + sin U frame by using
the boundary condition that 1 and d1 /dZ 0 as Z . Thus, finally the plane solitary wave
solution Mace and Hellberg [2001] for the electron-acoustic soliton can be written as,
2
1 = 0 sech
(3.42)
where the amplitude 0 and width of the electron acoustic solitons are given by
3U
0 =
,
a cos
"
=2
cos b cos2 + c sin2

U
#
1/2
(3.43)
The soliton speed is represented by U and is the angle between the direction of wave propagation and external magnetic field B0 . Eq. (3.36), which represents the linear dispersion relation,
70
is solved numerically using Muller routine for positive real roots to calculate soliton width and
amplitude. It is important to mention here that by dropping the electron beam component and
temperature effects, the maximum soliton amplitude given by Eq. (3.43) becomes identical to that
derived by Sultana et al. (2012). By solving Eq. (3.42) we can investigate the parametric regime
of the solitary waves of our model.
3.3.4
The electron acoustic solitons in a weakly magnetized plasma has been studied for the parameters
of Burst a observed from the Viking satellite in the day side auroral zone: cold electron density
n0c = 0.5 cm3 , hot electron density n0h = 2.0 cm3 , beam electron density n0b = 1.0 cm3 ,
hot electron temperature Th = 250 eV and ambient magnetic field, B0 = 3570nT . Eq. (3.42)
predicts negative potential solitary structures. In Fig. (3.6), profiles of negative solitary structures
are obtained for various values of kappa for = 300 , U = 0.05, vb0 = 0.1, c,b = 6.78 and
i = 3.68 103 . Fig. 3.6 shows the variation of soliton amplitude for various values of
kappa. It can be seen from the figure that the increase in superthermality (i.e. lower values of
kappa) leads to decrease in the solitary potential amplitude which appears in conformity with the
results for small amplitude electron acoustic solitons obtained by Sultana et al. (2012) and Javidan
and Pakzad (2013). However, this result appears to be contradicting the results for the case of
unmagnetized plasmas in which higher superthermality accounts for the higher solitary amplitudes
for a fixed Mach number discussed in chapter 2. Here, it has to be clearly mentioned that the value
of the Mach number V (or root of the polynomial equation arising from dispersion relation Eq.
3.36) is different for different kappa values. Thus, the figure 3.6 effectively describes the variation
of soliton amplitude with the Mach number through changes in kappa values. Therefore, the
parameter kappa explaining the intense solitary waves for a fixed speed M in arbitrary amplitude
case differs from this case. The corresponding electric field amplitude for the parameters of Fig.
3.6 gives us higher amplitude for distribution of electrons than the Maxwellian distribution (i.e.
similar to Fig. 4b of Sultana and Kourakis (2011)).
71
Figure 3.6: Variation of the rarefactive soliton profile for various values of for the parameters
nb0 = 1.0 cm3 , nh0 = 1.5 cm3 , nc0 = 0.2 cm3 , Tc = Ti = 0.001, Tb = 0.01, B0 = 3570nT ,
= 300 , U=0.05, vb0 = 0.1, c,b = 6.78, i = 3.69 103 . The curves shown here are for =2
(V=0.6003), 3 (V=0.7632) and 4 (V=0.8225).
Figure 3.7: Variation of the rarefactive soliton profile for various values of Tb /Th = 0.0(V= 0.7455),
0.02 (V= 0.7809)and 0.05 (V=0.8336). Other values are same as Fig. (3.6) .
72
Figure 3.8: Variation of the rarefactive soliton profile for values of vb0 for = 3.0 The curves
shown here are for vb0 = 0.0 (V=0.6890), 0.5 (V=1.0212) and 1.0 (V=1.5950). Other values are
same as Fig. (3.6) .
Figure 3.9: Variation of the rarefactive soliton profile for various values of for = 3.0. The
curves shown here are for = 300 , 450 , 600 and 800 (V=0.7632) Other values are same as Fig.
(3.6) .
73
In Figure 3.7 the effects of beam electron temperature is shown for fixed = 3.0. Other parameters
used are same as in Figure 1. The soliton amplitude is maximum for Tb /Th =0 case. The inclusion
of beam temperature effects reduces the solitary potential amplitudes significantly. Further, the
width also narrows down against the increase in beam electron temperature. Similarly, the increase
in beam electron velocities reduces the solitary wave amplitudes and narrows the width of the
solitons, as shown in Figure 3.8.
Variation of solitary potential amplitude with the angle of propagation, is plotted in Figure 3.9.
It is seen that the soliton amplitude increases for increase in angle of propagation, . However, the
soliton width increases for increase in angle of propagation and decreases beyond certain limit.
3.4
Concluding remarks
In this chapter, the characteristics of electron acoustic waves in magnetized plasma in two component (sec: 3.2) and four component plasma model (sec: 3.3) are discussed. Our conclusions are
summarized as follows:
Arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic solitary waves in a two component electron-ion magnetoplasma have been studied using Sagdeev pseudo-potential analysis in section 3.2. Linear properties
of the electron-acoustic waves in such plasmas have also been discussed. Our numerical results
show that only negative solitary potential structure can be generated through this model. It is worth
mentioning that only critical Mach number gets affected by the angle of propagation but not the
upper limit of the Mach number for which soliton solution exist. The electric field amplitude is
reduced by the inclusion of thermal effects. It is to be noted that, kappa distribution accounts for
higher electric field values than the Maxwellian.
Our theoretical model of the electron-acoustic solitary waves in magnetized plasma consisting of
energetic ions and electrons obeying -distribution may be helpful to explain the solitary waves
in the space plasma environment where higher values of electric field are observed. Our model
74
requires ion temperature to be much higher than electron temperature which can be satisfied in
space plasma environments such as in Earths bow shock, plasma sheet boundary layer, magnetotail
regions of the Earths magnetosphere.
The electron acoustic solitons in a four-component magnetized superthermal plasmas is discussed
in section 3.3. KdV-ZK equation is derived from multi-fluid equations to analyze the electron
acoustic solitons in a small amplitude region. It is found that only negative potential solitary structures exist for the parameters considered here. Theoretical results are applied to the Viking observations [Dubouloz et al, 1993] to explain the broadband electrostatic noise (BEN) observations in
terms of electron acoustic solitons. In the Figures we have directly used the observed parameters
in normalized form and later, calculated the electric field amplitudes from the theoretical model.
Our results show that lower values of kappa gives higher electric field amplitudes and an increase in
beam temperature decreases the electric field amplitude. Also, the increase in beam velocity results
in decreasing the solitary potential amplitudes. Further, the unnormalized electric field amplitudes
calculated for various angles of propagation through the parameter, , are found to be in the range
(7.8 - 45) mV/m for = 300 - 800 . This shows that electron acoustic solitons propagating at large
angle to B0 have higher electric field amplitudes. The corresponding spatial width and pulse width
are found to be in the range of (1500-2260)m and (0.29-0.44)ms, respectively whereas the solitary
wave speed is found to be about 5100 km/s. The Fourier transform of these solitary structures
would produce broadband electrostatic noise with peaks near the inverse pulse width [Lakhina et
al, 2011], i.e. between 2.3 - 3.5 kHz. The BEN spectra for the Burst a [Dubouloz et al, 1993]
peaks near 3 to 4 kHz and has maximum electric field 37 mV/m. Thus our results are in good
agreement with the observations.
The limitation of the model is that it can explain solitary potential structures in weakly magnetized
superthermal plasmas as the effect of magnetic field comes through the second order terms. This
can be further improved by considering higher order terms. In space plasma situations, where high
magnetic field environment is present, this model may not fit as such. In these situations one has
to use an expansion scheme different from Eq. (3.35) for the perpendicular velocity components
75
so that the magnetic field effects are felt even at the first order of , i.e., the dispersion relation
contains the terms that depend on the magnetic field.
Chapter 4
Ion acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas
4.1
Introduction
The particle velocity distributions in many physical situations, e.g., in the laboratory, space, and
astrophysical plasmas are not Maxwellian. In space plasmas, particles typically have distribution
functions with an enhanced high-energy tail which are well modelled by a generalized Lorentzian
(or kappa) distribution with spectral index . The studies of linear and nonlinear electron acoustic
solitons using distribution function is already discussed in Chapters 2 and 3. Ion acoustic waves
are another type of basic wave processes in space plasmas associated with low frequency waves.
The existence of ion-acoustic waves in an unmagnetized two component plasma have been studied by Washimi and Taniuti (1966) by using the Korteweg-de Vries (K-dV) type equation. Buti
(1980) showed that plasmas with two Maxwellian electron populations can support large amplitude
rarefactive structures. The propagation characteristics of ion-cyclotron and ion-acoustic solitons
using exact ion dynamics and quasi-neutrality conditions in presence of magnetic field is studied
by Yashvir et al. (1984). Das and Verheest (1989) have studied ion-acoustic solitons in a low-
magnetized plasma consisting of isothermal electrons and a number of adiabatic ions. Baboolal
et al. (1990) investigated the existence conditions of the large amplitude ion-acoustic solitons and
76
CHAPTER 4. Ion acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas
77
double layers in a plasma consisting of two Boltzmann electrons (hot and cool) components and
single cool ions. Reddy and Lakhina (1991) have studied obliquely propagating small amplitude
ion acoustic solitary waves and double layers in auroral magnetized plasma consisting of two positive ions (oxygen-hydrogen) and two-electron species. Their analysis predicted either negative
potential double layers, or negative potential solitons or positive potential solitons in distinct parametric regime. Reddy et al. (1992) extended the analysis to include a number of ion beams. Cairns
et al. (1995) showed that it is possible to obtain both compressive and rarefactive solitons in a
plasma consisting of non-thermal electrons (with excess energetic particles) and cold ions. They
were able to explain the Freja satellite observations [Dovner et al, 1994] of the solitary structures
with density depletions. Baluku et al. (2010) revisited the existence domain of ion-acoustic solitons and double layers. They not only confirmed the earlier results of Baboolal et al. (1990) but
also found that depending upon the cool to hot electron temperature ratio, positive polarity solitons
can exist beyond the positive potential double layers. Berthomier et al. (1998) studied the ionacoustic solitary waves consisting of two Maxwellian electron populations with inclusion of finite
ion temperature. The characteristics of ion-acoustic solitons and weak double layers are found
from their study and explained the observations of auroral plasma made by the Viking satellite
[Koskinen et al, 1990; M
ailkki et al, 1993]. Ghosh and Lakhina (2004) have studied the parallel
and oblique propagation of rarefactive ion-acoustic solitary structures in two electron temperature
multi-ion plasma.
There have been several studies on the ion-acoustic waves in electron-positron and electron-positronion plasmas [Berezhiani and Mahajan, 1994; Berezhiani et al, 1994; Mahmood and Akhtar, 2008;
Mahmood et al, 2003; Zhao et al, 1994]. Ion-acoustic waves and solitons in two-component
electron-ion magnetized plasma have been studied by Lee and Kan (1981). Using the reductive
perturbation method, obliquely propagating ion-acoustic solitons in a magnetized plasma consisting of warm adiabatic ions and nonthermal electrons have been examined by Cairns et al. (1996).
Bandyopadhyay and Das (1999) studied the stability of ion-acoustic waves in a magnetized plasma
composed of non-thermal electrons and warm adiabatic ions. The effect of non-thermal electrons
on solitary waves and double layers in a plasma consisting of warm positive and negative ions has
78
been studied by Gill et al. (2004) using KdV and m-KdV theory. Abbasi and Pajouh (2007) studied
the ion-acoustic solitons considering free and trapped electrons following kappa-distribution and
ions following fluid dynamical equations. Lakhina et al. (2008a, 2008b) studied large amplitude
ion and electron acoustic waves in an unmagnetized multi-component plasma system consisting
of cold background electrons and ions, a hot electron beam and a hot ion beam. It was found
that three types of solitary waves, namely, slow ion-acoustic, ion-acoustic and electron-acoustic
solitons can exist provided that the Mach numbers exceed the critical values. The fully nonlinear
ion-acoustic solitary waves in a plasma with two distinct ion species and non-thermal electrons is
studied by Sabry et al. (2009) and reported the solitary excitations of these waves and its dependence on mass and density ratios of ion species. Choi et al. (2010) studied the existence conditions
for electrostatic solitary waves and double layers in a nonthermal electron plasma with heavy ions.
They found that nonthermality of the electrons determines the existence of double layers.
4.2
Ion acoustic waves in electron ion plasma
The studies of ion-acoustic waves having superthermal particle distributions are important to understand the space plasma observations. The studies mentioned in the previous section have concentrated mainly on Maxwellian distribution of electrons or Cairns type distributions. Recently few
studies have attempted to examine ion-acoustic solitary structures in superthemal plasmas. Chuang
and Hau (2009) have studied the dynamics of small amplitude ion-acoustic solitons. The characteristics of existence conditions for two component ion-acoustic solitons is studied by Saini et
al. (2009). Saini and Kourakis (2010) examined the existence of arbitrary amplitude ion-acoustic
solitary waves in an unmagnetized plasma consisting of ions and excess superthermal electrons
(modelled by a kappa-type distribution) and an electron beam. Recently, Sultana et al. (2010)
have studied the magnetized ion-acoustic solitary waves in a two component plasma with kappadistributed electrons and fluid cool ions. They employed psuedo Sagdeev potential approach and
used quasi-neutrality condition. They studied the effect of obliqueness and superthermality of
electrons on the ion-acoustic solitary waves. The effect of superthermal electrons, modelled by
79
a Lorentzian velocity distribution function has been studied on obliquely propagating linear and
nonlinear ion-acoustic waves in a electron-ion magnetized plasma [Kadijani et al, 2011]. They
used the small amplitude theory to study the nonlinear ion-acoustic waves. In both of the above
mentioned studies, the effect of finite ion temperature on solitary structures was not considered.
In this chapter ion-acoustic waves in a two component magnetized plasma with hot superthermal
electrons and warm ions are discussed to extend the work of Sultana et al. (2010) to include finite
ion temperature.
4.2.1
Theoretical model
The model consists of fluid, adiabatic warm ions and hot electrons having kappa distribution. The
ambient magnetic field B0 = B0 z to lie along the z-axis, where z is the unit vector along the z axis
and ion-acoustic waves are propagating in the x z plane.
The ion dynamics are governed by fluid equations given by the set of following normalized equations,
ni (ni vx ) (ni vz )
+
+
=0
t
x
z
(4.1)
vx
vx
vx
ni
+ vx
+ vz
=
3ni
+ Rvy
t
x
z
x
x
(4.2)
vy
vy
vy
+ vx
+ vz
= Rvx
t
x
z
(4.3)
vz
vz
vz
ni
+ vx
+ vz
=
3ni
t
x
z
z
z
(4.4)
80
where n, vx , vy , vz represents density and the x, y, z-components of the velocity of the warm
ion fluid respectively and is the electrostatic potential, R = i /pi ; i = eB0 /mi c is the ion
cyclotron frequency and pi =
4N0 e2 /mi is the ion plasma frequency and = Ti /Te , is the ion
to electron temperature ratio. The adiabatic index = 3 in the momentum equation which is valid
for one degree of freedom. However, in a magnetized plasma =5/3 can be taken by considering
three degrees of freedom. Since, in our analysis, we have treated equation of motion and continuity
equation exactly, the results are not expected to change qualitatively by taking =5/3 instead of
=3.
In Eqs. (4.1) - (4.4), the following normalizations are used: densities are normalized with respect
to the equilibrium density N0 = N0e = N0i , temperatures by the electron temperature, Te , time by
1
the inverse of ion plasma frequency, pi
, velocities by the acoustic speed cs =
by the electron Debye length, de =
Te /mi , lengths
Te /4N0e e2 and the electrostatic potential, by Te /e.
The hot electrons are considered to follow the distribution function given by Thorne and Summers (1991) and the number density of hot electron is given by Eq. (2.11).
Using transformation = x + z M t (where M = V /cs is the Mach number, , are
the direction of cosines along x and z directions, i.e., = kx /k = sin ; = kz /k = cos ,
respectively and satisfy the relation 2 + 2 = 1). After the transformation, the above set of
equations (4.1) - (4.4) take the form
Continuity equation
M
ni
(ni vx )
(ni vz )
+
+
=0
(4.5)
Equation of motion, the x, y and z-components can be written as

LM
vx
ni
+
+ 3ni
Rvy = 0
(4.6)
vy
+ Rvx = 0
(4.7)
LM
LM
81
vz
ni
+
+ 3ni
=0
(4.8)
where LM = (M + vx + vz ). Eqs. (4.5) - (4.8) cannot be solved analytically due to the

complexity introduced by the magnetic field. However, by assuming quasi-neutrality condition,
ne = ni with appropriate boundary conditions, namely, (ne,i 1, vx,z 0, 0 and d/d
0, at ), the Sagdeev potential for such a system can be written as,
1
2
d
d
!2
+ (, M ) = 0
(4.9)
1 (, M )
,
2 (, M )
(4.10)
where
(, M ) = R2
with,
!
1 (, M ) =
1 + 2 1 1
M
!+3/2
3
2
+(M 2 + 2 ) 1 1
1 1
2
2M
+ 2 1 1
3
2
!+3/2
3
2
3
2
1
2
3
2
!#
+ 1
!1/2
!21
!4+3
3
2
3
2
2 3
+
1 1
2
+ 1 + 2 1 1
M
and
M2
1 1
2
"
3
2
!2+3
+
1 1
2
M
!1/2
!3+3/2
3
2
!3+3/2
3
2
!2+1
3
2
1 1
2
2M
!6+3 )
3
2
2 (, M ) = 1 M 2
1
2
3
2
!22
3
2
82
+ 3
1
2
3
2
!2 2
3
2
Equation (4.9) is the Sagdeev potential equation which must satisfy the following conditions:
(, M )=0, d(, M )/d =0, d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0; (, M )=0 at = 0 , and (, M ) <0
for 0 <| |<| 0 |, where 0 is the maximum amplitude of the solitons. Eq. (4.10) satisfies that
(, M ) and its first derivative with respect to vanish at =0. It is to be noted that the Sagdeev
potential given in Eq. (4.10) contains the effect of ion temperature through terms. For = 0, we
recover the equation (24) of Sultana et al. (2010).
From second derivative of the Eq. (4.9), the soliton condition d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 yields,
d2 (, M )
R2 (M 2 M02 )
|
=
<0
=0
d2
M 2 (M 2 M12 )
(4.11)
The condition d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 is satisfied when M > M0 , here M0 is the critical Mach
number given by,
M0 = 3 +
3
2
1
2
!1/2
(4.12)
and
M1 = 3 +
3
2
1
2
!1/2
(4.13)
The conclusion here is that M1 M0 , since = cos 1. Thus, the soliton condition
d2 (, M )/d2 < 0 at = 0 (i.e., inequality (4.11)) is satisfied when M0 < M < M1 for
6= 1. It is interesting to note that M0 and M1 are critical and upper limit of the Mach number,
respectively. Also, it is to be mentioned that for = 1, i.e., at parallel propagation ( = 0) inequality (4.11) cannot be satisfied because both critical Mach number (M0 ) and upper limit (M1 )
of the Mach number will coincide with each other, therefore soliton solution will not be possible.
Thus, M1 may be called as the maximum Mach number beyond which soliton solutions are not
possible. Further, upper limit of the Mach number does not depend on the angle of propagation.
83
It may be pointed out that Saini et al. (2009) carried out the analysis of ion-acoustic solitons in an
unmagnetized plasma with superthermal electrons and ions without considering the effect of finite
ion temperature. Further, for R = 0, and = Ti /Te = 0, we will not recover their results simply
because they have not considered quasi-neutrality condition. Instead they used Poisson equation
whereas we have assumed quasi-neutrality condition in order to obtain analytical expression for
the energy integral given by Eq. (4.9). Therefore, our analysis is valid only for long wavelength
perturbations and does not allow for R = 0 case. To recover the unmagnetized case of Saini et al.
(2009), one has to put R = 0 in Eqs.(4.2), (4.3), (4.6) and (4.7), and redo the above analysis and
use the Poisson equation instead of quasi-neutrality condition.
4.2.2
Numerical results
The soliton characteristics are described from the numerical solution of Eqs.(4.9) and (4.10). At
the outset it must be made clear that we recover all the analytical and numerical results of Sultana
et al. (2010) when thermal effects of ions are removed, i.e., = 0 case. Fig. 4.1 shows the
variation of Sagdeev potential (, M ) versus electrostatic potential for different values of the
Mach numbers for = Ti /Te = 0.0 and 0.01.
The = 0.0 case (dashed line) corresponds to
the results of Sultana et al. (2010). The change in existence regime of soliton with the inclusion
of temperature effects is shown in the case of = 0.01 case (solid line). The parameters chosen
are the same as of figure 7a of Sultana et al. (2010), namely superthermality index, = 2, =
cos = 0.9, ratio of cyclotron to plasma frequency of the ions, R = i /pi = 0.5/1.4 which
corresponds to i = 0.5 and pi = 1.4 in Sultana et al. (2010). Here, we study the effect of ion
temperature on ion-acoustic solitary waves, therefore, we chose ion to electron temperature ratio
= Ti /Te = 0.01. We would like to mention here that in Sultana et al. (2010) i = 0.5, pi = 1.4
are taken as dimensionless parameters which is not the right way to choose these frequencies as
they are not the normalized parameters. It is the ratio, R = i /pi of these two frequencies
which is a dimensionless parameter. It can be seen from the figure that amplitude of the ionacoustic solitary waves increases with Mach number and with the inclusion of warm ions, the
84
Figure 4.1: Variation of the Sagdeev potential (, M ) with respect to for various values of
Mach number, M for = 2.0, R = i /pi = 0.5/1.4, and = cos = 0.9. The dashed ( ) and
solid () lines are corresponding to = Ti /Te = 0.0, and = 0.01, respectively
85
Figure 4.2: Variation of normalized Sagdeev potential (, M ) with respect to for various values
of superthermality index, for Mach number, M = 0.8, R = i /pi = 0.2/1.3, = 0.01 and = 0.8.
Figure 4.3: Variation of the soliton profile for the parameters of Fig. (4.2) .
86
of for = 3, M = 0.76, R = i /pi = 0.5/1.5 and = 0.01.
87
of for = 3, M = 0.7, R = i /pi = 0.2/1.3 and = 0.8.
88
Figure 4.8: Variation of normalized real potential, with respect to for various values of
R=i /pi for = 0.01 for = 2, M = 0.6, and = 0.9.
89
range of Mach number for which soliton solutions are obtained also widens with lower (critical
Mach number) and upper (maximum Mach number) Mach numbers shifting to the higher side. It
is also clear from the analytical expressions for M0 and M1 given by equations (4.12) and (4.13),
respectively. A comparison of our results of figure 1 for M = 0.56 with Sultana et al.(2010) figure
7a for M = 0.56 curves shows significant reduction in amplitude of the solitary waves due to the
inclusion of finite temperature of the ions. We think that the inclusion of finite ion temperature
gives rise to dispersive effects which tends to suppress the effects due to nonlinearity, thus, leading
to smaller ion-acoustic soliton amplitudes.
Fig. 4.2 shows the variation of Sagdeev potential amplitude (, M ) with respect to for various
values of superthermality index, , for the parameters, = 0.8, M = 0.8, = 0.01, R = i /pi =
0.2/1.3 (same parameters as figure 8 of Sultana et al. (2010) for various values of superthermality
index, ). The associated soliton profile is plotted in Fig. 4.3. Here also the reduction in the
ion-acoustic soliton amplitude for 6= 0 is quite appreciable. The soliton profiles are steeper
for increase in superthermal electrons (i.e., decrease in ). These results are in agreement of the
findings of Saini et al. (2009) and Sultana et al. (2010).
The Sagdeev potential and soliton profile variations for various values of and are plotted in
Figs. (4.4) - (4.5) and (4.6) - (4.7) for the parameters, = 3, M = 0.76, = 0.01, R = i /pi =
0.5/1.3 (same parameters as figure 9 of Sultana et al. (2010)). The obliqueness effect through
the parameter gives higher amplitudes for higher values of obliquity. It is important to note that
with increasing values as one approaches = 1 case, the soliton solution will not exist. This is
because of both critical and upper Mach numbers coincide with each other at = 1( = 0) [refer
to Eq. (4.12) and Eq. (4.13)].
On the other hand, the inclusion of temperature (via ) results in reducing the observable solitary
amplitudes. In figure 4.6, amplitude, of the ion-acoustic soliton versus is shown for the parameters: = 3, M = 0.7, = 0.8, R = i /pi = 0.2/1.3, and for various values of the ion
to electron temperature ratio, = Ti /Te as depicted on the curves. It is important to note that
amplitude of the soliton is maximum for cool ions ( = 0) and it decreases as the ion to electron
90
duration ( ) with respect to for = 0.9, = 2.0, total equilibrium electron density N0e = 2cm3 ,
ambient magnetic field, B0 = 104 nT and R = i /pi = 1/1.86. The values of B0 , R and =
0.0246 (last row) corresponds to the parameters observed by Viking satellite in the auroral region
[Berthomier et al, 1998].
V (kms1 )
E (mV m1 )
W(km)
= W/V(ms)
0.0
25.9-28.8
0.01-33.7
1.27-0.14
49-4.8
0.01
27.1-30.1
0.04-25.8
0.87-0.15
32.1-5
0.02
28.2-31.3
0.17-21.6
0.6-0.16
21.1-5.15
0.0246
28.7-31.8
0.18-20.1
0.59-0.17
20.5-5.25
temperature increases. Also, width of the soliton increases with the increase in values.
It has to be pointed out that the dimensionless parameters i , and pi should be chosen as the ratio
of two frequencies, unlike the case of Sultana et al. (2010). In Fig. 4.8, the effect of the magnetic
field on the soliton is shown through the parameter R = i /pi . It shows that, the solitary widths
are affected by the magnetic field and the maximum amplitude remains constant. These results are
in agreement of Sultana et al. (2010).
4.3
Concluding remarks
In this chapter, we have examined the nonlinear properties of ion-acoustic solitons in a magnetized
two component plasma. This work has given insights of thermal effects on ion-acoustic solitons
that was neglected in the study by Sultana et al. (2010). They had studied the ion-acoustic solitons
in a magnetized plasma with kappa distributed electrons and cold ions. In our analysis, we have
shown that the presence of warm ions affects the speed, amplitude, width and pulse duration of
solitons. The lower and upper limit of the Mach numbers gets affected by the presence of warm
91
ions and both critical (M0 ) as well as upper (M1 ) Mach numbers are pushed to the higher side. The
lower Mach number limit M1 and upper Mach number limit M2 are calculated both theoretically
and numerically. The ion-acoustic soliton amplitude increases with the increase in superthermality
of electrons. An increase in the magnetic field, i.e., R value, reduces the width of the ion-acoustic
solitons without affecting their amplitudes.
Our theoretical model is applied to the observational parameters of Berthomier et al. (1998),
namely,ambient magnetic field, B0 = 104 nT , ion temperature, Ti = 0.64eV , electron temperature,
Te = 26eV , ion cyclotron frequency, i = 1000 rad/s and ion plasma frequency, pi = 1860 rad/s.
For the above mentioned parameters the ratio of cyclotron to plasma frequency of the ions comes
out to be R = 1/1.86 and = Ti /Te = 0.0246. The results are tabulated (cf 4.1) for different values
of . The last row in the table summarizes the range of soliton speed, amplitude, width, and pulse
duration which comes to be in the range of (28.7 31.8) km/s, (0.18 20.1)mV /m, (590 167)m
and (20.5 5.25) ms, respectively and corresponds to Viking satellite observations in the auroral
region. Berthomier et al. (1998) reported soliton speed, maximum electric field, width and pulse
duration, respectively, to be (550)km/s, (1040)mV /m, few hundred meters and 20ms
from the above observations. Thus, our results are fairly matching with this specific observation.
Chapter 5
Conclusions and future work
In this thesis, various theoretical models for the generation and propagation of linear and nonlinear
electron and ion-acoustic waves in multi-component unmagnetized and magnetized space plasmas
have been developed. Theoretical models developed here consider superthermal electrons/ions
described by the nonthermal kappa distributions. The effect of various plasma parameters such as
superthermality, density, temperature and beam speed on the propagation of these waves has been
investigated in details in the chapters 2-4. The theoretical models developed in this thesis have
been applied to satellite observations in the various regions of the Earths magnetosphere. In this
chapter, summary of the results obtained in the thesis and scope for future work are presented.
5.1
Electron and ion acoustic waves in space plasmas
In chapter 2, the linear and nonlinear propagation of electron-acoustic waves in multi-component,

unmagnetized plasmas is presented. The hot superthermal electrons are assumed to have the kappa
distributions. Linear dispersion relation is derived for these models and compared with earlier
models in limiting cases. The nonlinear generation of electron-acoustic waves is studied using the
92
CHAPTER 5. Conclusions and future work
93
arbitrary amplitude Sagdeev pseudo potential analysis. Firstly, the theoretical model for electronacoustic waves in three component plasma consisting of cold electrons, hot superthermal electrons
and fluid ions (sec: 2.2) is presented. Our theoretical results show that the superthermal distribution
function is accountable for higher electric field amplitude than the Maxwellian or non-thermal
(Cairns type) distribution function and temperature effects play an important role. The inclusion
of cold electron temperature significantly reduces the regime for the existence of the electronacoustic solitons and their electric field amplitudes. Similarly, the maximum soliton velocity, width
and pulse duration are significantly reduced with the inclusion of finite cold electron temperature.
Further, the ranges of soliton velocity, electric field, soliton width and pulse duration decreases
with an increase in the cold electron temperature.
The presence of beam electrons and/or ions affects the regime of soliton existence. We extended
our three component model to include electron beam to study a four component plasma model of
electron acoustic solitary waves (sec: 2.3). The results show that inclusion of an electron beam
alters the minimum value of spectral index , of the superthermal electron distribution and Mach
number for which electron-acoustic solitons can exist and also changes their width and electric
field amplitude. The electric field amplitudes in a four component model (cf. Table 2.1) is lower
than the three component model of electron acoustic waves (cf. Table 2.3). The range of kappa
values also widens due to the presence of electron beam and minimum value of kappa for which
soliton solutions are obtained are higher as compared to three component model.
Chapter 3 describes the characteristics of arbitrary amplitude electron acoustic solitary waves in
a two component electron-ion magnetoplasma using Sagdeev pseudo-potential analysis. Linear
properties of the electron-acoustic waves in such plasmas have also been discussed. It is found
that only negative solitary potential structures can be generated through this model. It is worth
mentioning that only critical Mach number gets affected by the angle of propagation but not the
upper limit of the Mach number for which soliton solution exist. The electric field amplitude is
reduced by the inclusion of thermal effects. Also, kappa distribution accounts for higher electric
94
field values than the Maxwellian. The electric field amplitude increases with the increase in magnetic field, whereas soliton width as well as pulse duration decreases. This model is very restrictive
in space plasmas and requires the ion temperature much higher than the electron temperature. The
results from this study were found to be in good agreement of the wind spacecraft observations in
the bow shock region [Bale et al, 1998].
The propagation of electron acoustic solitary waves in a magnetized plasma consisting of fluid
cold electrons, electron beam and superthermal hot electrons having kappa velocity distribution
and ions is investigated in the small amplitude limit using reductive perturbation theory. The
Korteweg-de-Vries- Zakharov-Kuznetsov (KdV-ZK) equation governing the dynamics of electron
acoustic solitary waves is derived. The solution of the KdV-ZK equation predicts the existence of
negative potential solitary structures. It is found that increasing either the speed or temperature
of beam electrons tend to reduce both amplitude and width of the electron acoustic solitons. Increasing the superthermality of the hot electrons also results in reduction of soliton amplitude and
width. Furthermore, higher soliton amplitude are found at larger angle of propagation. For auroral
plasma parameters observed by Viking, the obliquely propagating electron-acoustic solitary waves
have electric field amplitudes in the range (7.8 - 45) mV/m and pulse widths (0.29-0.44) ms which
are in good agreement of the observations. The Fourier transform of these electron acoustic solitons would result in a broadband frequency spectra with peaks near 2.3-3.5 kHz, thus providing
a possible explanation of the broadband electrostatic noise observed in the auroral region of the
Earths magnetosphere.
In chapter 4, obliquely propagating ion-acoustic solitary waves have been examined in a magnetized plasma composed of kappa distributed electrons and fluid ions with finite temperature. The
Sagdeev potential approach is used to study the properties of finite amplitude solitary waves. Using
a quasi-neutrality condition, it is possible to reduce the set of equations to a single equation (energy integral equation), which describes the evolution of ion-acoustic solitary waves in magnetized
plasmas. The temperature of warm ions affects the speed, amplitude, width, and pulse duration of
solitons. Both the critical and the upper Mach numbers are increased by an increase in the ion
95
temperature. The ion-acoustic soliton amplitude increases with the increase in superthermality of
electrons. For auroral plasma parameters, the model predicts the soliton speed, amplitude, width,
and pulse duration, respectively, to be in the range of (28.7 31.8) km/s, (0.18 20.1) mV/m; (590
167) m, and (20.5 5.25) ms, which are in good agreement with Viking observations.
5.2
Suggestion for the future work
In this thesis, theoretical models for electron and ion-acoustic waves in multi-component unmagnetized and magnetized space plasmas have been developed. These models consider superthermal
electrons/ions described by the nonthermal kappa distributions. The effect of various plasma parameters such as superthermality, density, temperature and beam speed on the propagation of these
waves has been investigated in detail. We have found only negative solitary potential structures
in our preliminary study because the focus of the thesis has been on the explanation of satellite
observations in the various regions of the Earths magnetosphere. In the thesis, positive potential
solitons and double layers have not been obtained, therefore it is a possibility that these structures
can be found by examining the parameter space. More recently, the other area on the forefront
of research has been existence of supersolitons, which occur when three consecutive local extrema of the Sagdeev pseudopotential between the undisturbed conditions and an accessible root
are supported. In the electric field, the usual bipolar soliton shape is enriched by the presence of a
subsidiary maximum on each side of the structure. The existence of the supersolitons also can be
explored. Another unexplained area is the interaction of electrostatic solitary structures with the
plasma particles leading to heating and acceleration of the plasma. Such investigations are best
done by numerical simulations employing particle codes.
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SYNOPSIS OF THE THESIS TO BE SUBMITTED

TO THE
UNIVERSITY OF MUMBAI
FOR THE DEGREE OF
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN PHYSICS
IN THE FACULTY OF
SCIENCE
TITLE OF THE THESIS
: STUDY OF SOME LINEAR AND NONLINEAR

PHENOMENA IN SPACE PLASMAS
NAME OF THE CANDIDATE : DEVANANDHAN S
NAME OF THE GUIDE
: Prof. SATYAVIR SINGH
PLACE OF RESEARCH
: INDIAN INSTITUTE OF GEOMAGNETISM,

PLOT NO. 5, SECTOR - 18,
KALAMBOLI HIGHWAY, NEW PANVEL (W)
NAVI MUMBAI- 410 218, INDIA
NUMBER AND DATE
: 11/12-10-2010
OF REGISTRATION
DATE OF SUBMISSION
: 10-04-2013
SIGNATURE OF STUDENT
SIGNATURE OF GUIDE
Synopsis
A plasma is defined as a quasineutral gas of charged and neutral particles which exhibits collective behavior [Chen 1974]. It accounts for nearly 99% of the matter in the universe. Plasmas
are ubiquitous in astrophysical, space and laboratory environments. Solar wind, magnetosphere
and ionosphere of the Earth, magnetospheres of planets, aurora, interplanetary magnetic field are
few examples of space plasma system. In space plasmas, the long range electromagnetic forces are
more dominant than the short range interatomic/ intermolecular forces. A large number of waves
can be generated in plasmas. Depending on the plasma approximation, the properties of various
plasma waves can be studied. Any specific wave type can be related to one of the discrete modes
of plasma by examining its dispersion relation.
For example, if we consider, isotropic, unmangetized plasma consisting of equal number of ions
and electrons and ions are fixed in the background and electrons are allowed to oscillate in thermal
plasmas it will give rise to electron plasma waves. Such waves are of very long wavelength and
are known as Langmuir waves. If we include the ion effects, low frequency waves can be studied
through ion acoustic waves. In addition, if we introduce magnetic field effects, it will lead to
variety of plasma modes, such as, Alfven waves, magnetosonic waves etc.,
Numerous methods are available to study the properties of space plasmas by considering wave
aspect. There are several instances in literatures where the wave analogy has been used to study
space plasmas considering electron-acoustic (Lashmore-Davies and Martin, 1973, Gary and Tokar,
1985), ion-acoustic (Washimi and Taniuti, 1966) and dust-acoustic waves (Shukla and Silin, 1992).
Electron acoustic waves can exist in a plasma with two different electrons, namely cold and hot
1
Synopsis
electrons and ions (Mace et al 1991). The cold electrons give the inertia and hot electrons provide
restoring force and ions act as neutralizing background. In addition to the two electron component
system, electron and/or ion beams are included to study the effects of beam on electron acoustic
solitons (Kakad et al 2007, Lakhina et al 2011, Singh et al 2011). The electron acoustic waves can
also exist in a pure electron-ion plasma where ion temperature is much higher than electron temperature (Buti et al 1980). Ion-acoustic waves are another basic wave modes studied in electron-ion,
electron-positron-ion and multicomponent plasmas (Buti 1980, Reddy and Lakhina 1991, Mahmood et al 2003, Lakhina et al 2011). Most of the work on these nonlinear waves have considered
Maxwellian particle distributions.
However, the assumption of Maxwellian distribution function of particles is ideal one and in space
plasmas non thermal populations are present (Cairns et al 1995). This has opened up new area
of research studying linear and nonlinear waves in non thermal space plasma systems (Singh and
Lakhina 2004, Singh et al 2011). On the other hand, satellite measurements with particle distributions having Maxwellian-like core with high energy tail is also observed in space plasmas(Scudder
et al 1981, Feldman et al. 1983). Vasyliunas (1968) first used superthermal distribution function
to fit solar wind data obtained from OGO 1 and OGO 3 satellite. Though it has been used as an
empirical fit, now theoretical explanation clearly explains that the superthermal kappa distribution
(- distribution) is a generalized Lorentzian distribution (Baluku and Hellberg 2008). In the limit
of spectral index, , the Maxwellian distribution can be retrieved.
Recently, several works on electron-acoustic waves and ion-acoustic waves featuring superthermal
distribution function for electron and/or ion have been reported and have generated lot of interest (Mace and Hellberg 2009, Tribeche and Boubakour 2009, Saini and Kourakis 2009, Sultana
and Kourakis 2011, Sultana et al 2012). This thesis is devoted to study electron-acoustic and
ion-acoustic solitons in superthermal unmagnetized and magnetized plasmas with distribution
function for ions and electrons. The finite temperature effects, beam effects on such solitons are
examined in detail. In the following sections, the content of the different chapters in the thesis is
summarized.
Synopsis
Chapter 1
The first chapter briefly describes the space plasma environment which includes solar wind,
interplanetary magnetic field, terrestrial magnetosphere, ionosphere and magnetosphere of outer
planets. Detailed analysis of different wave forms based on linear dispersion relation is discussed.
Theoretical methods used to examine the plasma waves employing multi fluid and kinetic theory
are well established. Using multi-fluid equations, the nonlinear wave equation of Korteweg-de
Vries (KdV)-type or pseudo potential type equation can be obtained. This equation gives us solitary
type solution which can be studied numerically. A brief discussion on KdV and Sagdeev pseudo
potential methods is presented.
The study on electron-acoustic waves in unmagnetized (Duboluoz et al 1991, 1993, Mace et al
1991, Singh et al 2001) and magnetized plasmas (Mace and Hellberg 2001, Mamun et al 2002,
Elwakil et al 2011) using Maxwellian and non-thermal distribution function have been discussed.
The work on ion-acoustic waves featuring Maxwellian (Lakhina et al 2008a, 2008b) and nonthermal (Cairns et al 1995, Gill et al 2004, Verheest et al 2012) distribution function is presented.
Superthermal behavior of plasmas had been observed in space environments, such as, solar wind,
terrestrial magnetosphere, auroral zone etc., (Scudder et al 1981, Feldman et al 1983). The main
focus of the thesis is to study electron acoustic and ion acoustic solitons in such unmagnetized and
magnetized superthermal plasmas using -distribution. We have used the distribution function
given by Summers and Thorne (1991). Detailed description of earlier works on electron-acoustic
and ion-acoustic solitons using superthermal distribution function is outlined.
Chapter 2
Arbitrary amplitude electron-acoustic waves in an unmagnetized three and four component

plasma using Sagdeev pseudo potential method is described in this chapter. In the first case, three
component plasma consisting of cold electron, hot electron and ion is considered. Hot electrons are
Synopsis
assumed to follow the velocity distribution function. Linear dispersion relation is derived from
the basic set of equations to study the electron acoustic solitons. The energy integral is obtained
from the Sagdeev methodology and it is examined numerically for observed parameters in the dayside auroral zone made by Viking satellite. The numerical results show that inclusion of electron
temperature plays an important role for restricting the regime of solitary waves and it brings down
the electric field amplitude. In addition, the effects of superthermality, Mach number and the hot
electron density on electron-acoustic solitons is examined. Increase in superthermality (decrease
in values of ) results in higher solitary potential amplitudes than the Maxwellian distribution of
hot electrons. Solitary wave amplitude increases for increase in Mach number and hot electron
densities.
Several observations in the Earths magnetosphere confirms the presence of electron beam. The
work described in the previous paragraph is extended to include electron beam effects on the
electron-acoustic solitary waves in superthermal plasmas. In this model, the electron beam dynamics is governed by the fluid equations. The effect of Mach number, hot electron density and
superthermal index on solitons is similar to the case of three component plasma model. However, it
is found that electron beam alters the regime of the electrons significantly and reduces the electric
field amplitude of the solitons. Theoretical results are applied to the observation of Viking satellite
data and the numerical values are found to be in good agreement with the observations.
Chapter 3
The complexity of the model increases with inclusion of magnetic field effects. Third chapter
describes the electron acoustic waves in superthermal magnetized, two-component electron-ion
plasma. It also includes the generalized four-component plasma studied in small amplitude limit.
In the first case, two component pure electron-ion magnetized plasma with ion temperature (Ti )
much higher than the electron temperature (Te ) is considered (ie. Ti >> Te ). Ions are considered
to be superthermal. Plasma approximation is used to complete the set of fluid equations. Negative
Synopsis
potential solitons have been found to exist in this model. The necessary condition for obliquity is
derived. The soliton condition gives the analytical expression for minimum and maximum mach
numbers for which solitons can exist. It is also found that, the obliquity affects only the critical
mach number, but the maximum mach number is independent of angle of propagation. The variation of minimum and maximum Mach number for various values of angle of propagation shows
that the decrease in angle of propagation increases the critical Mach number for solitons to exist.
Other parameters such as Mach number, superthermality, and temperature ratio exhibits the similar behavior as unmagnetized plasmas. The electrostatic structures in the terrestrial bow shock by
WIND spacecraft data is compared with theoretical results and good agreement have been found
with these observations.
In the second case, the four component electron-acoustic magnetized plasma consisting of superthermal hot electrons, fluid cold electron, electron beam and ion is considered. It is not possible
to reduce the basic set of equations to derive the energy integral using Sagdeev pseudo potential technique. To study the propagation of electron-acoustic solitons, the reductive perturbation
method (Washimi and Taniuti, 1966) is used which describes the small amplitude nonlinear waves.
Our model is applicable only for weakly magnetized plasmas. Using the reductive perturbation
method, the Korteweg-de Vries-Zakharov-Kuznetsov is derived and solitary wave solutions are obtained to study the electron-acoustic solitary structures and their dependence on the several plasma
parameters
Chapter 4
In the fourth chapter, ion-acoustic waves using superthermal distribution function for electrons
in an electron-ion magnetoplasma is considered. This study is helpful to understand the dynamics
of ion-acoustic waves having superthermal particles. The finite temperature effects shows significant changes in the critical Mach number and maximum Mach number. This model predicts the
positive potential structures and no double layers have been found.
Synopsis
The properties of ion-acoustic waves are dominated by the presence of superthermal particles. For
fixed values of Mach number, the soliton amplitude increase with increase in angle of propagation
and temperature ratio. Variation in magnetic field affects only the solitary width and amplitude
remains constant. Maximum electric field is obtained for higher values of Mach number. The
complete range of soliton velocity, electric field, width and pulse duration is calculated. The results
are applied to the observations of Viking satellite in the dayside auroral region.
Chapter 5
The important results and findings from the studies described in the second, third and fourth
chapters are summarized and scope for the future work is discussed. The application of theoretical models are highlighted for selected observations. Further, these models can be used to fit
the observational data where the specific assumptions are satisfied. Several other combination of
multi-component electron- and ion-acoustic solitons other than the above models can be studied
to understand the features of linear and nonlinear phenomena in other region of space plasmas.
The more general theoretical and numerical model can be developed to study the electron- and
ion-acoustic solitons in magnetized plasmas.
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Synopsis
Lakhina, G. S., A. P. Kakad, S. V. Singh, and F. Verheest, Ion- and electron-acoustic solitons in
two-electron temperature space plasmas, Phys. Plasmas, 15, 062903, 2008a.
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electron-positron-ion plasmas, New J. of Physics, 5, 28, 2003.
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presence of non-thermal electrons and a warm electron beam on the auroral field lines, Phys.
Plasmas, 18, 122306, 2011.
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electron-acoustic waves, Adv. Space Res., 28, 11, 1643, 2001.
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10
Synopsis
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with OGO 1 and OGO 3, J. Geophys. Res., 73, 9, 2839, 1968.
Verheest, F., M. A. Hellberg, and T. K. Baluku, Arbitrary amplitude ion-acoustic soliton coexistence and polarity in a plasma with two ion species, Phys. Plasmas, 19, 032305, 2012.
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(Prof. Satyavir Singh)
(Devanandhan S)
Guiding Teacher
Candidate

Study of Space Plasmas

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STUDY OF SOME LINEAR AND NONLINEAR

PHENOMENA IN SPACE PLASMAS

INDIAN INSTITUTE OF GEOMAGNETISM

STATEMENT BY THE CANDIDATE

Full Name: Devanandhan S

Name: Prof. S. V. Singh

Statement required under 0.770

Statement required under 0.771

New findings from the work are listed below:

Obliquely propagating electron-acoustic waves in a pure electron-ion plasma revealed that

Electron-acoustic solitons studied in magnetized plasma show significant increase in the

Statement required under 0.771

Papers Published and communicated in Journals

(2) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitons in

(3) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic waves in

(4) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Effect of ion temperature

Phys. Plasmas, 20,012306, doi:10.1063/1.4776710, 2013.

(5) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina and R. Bharuthram, Small amplitude electron

Papers published in conference/symposium proceedings

(1) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Electrostatic solitary waves in multi-component

Papers presented in National and International conferences:

(2) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitary

(3) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, and G. S. Lakhina, Electron acoustic waves in a magnetized

(PLASMA-2011), Birla Institute of Technology, Patna, 20-23 December, 2011.

(5) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, and G. S. Lakhina, Obliquely propagating ion-acoustic solitary

(7) S. V. Singh, S. Devanandhan, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Ion-acoustic solitary waves

(8) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Electron acoustic solitary

(9) S. Devanandhan, S. V. Singh, G. S. Lakhina, and R. Bharuthram, Oblique propagation of

Statement required under 0.771

(Prof. Satyavir Singh)

Space plasma environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The Sun and the solar wind . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Interplanetary magnetic field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Earths magnetospheric regions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Magnetosphere of other planets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Governing equations in plasmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Equation of motion and Maxwells equations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Electron plasma wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Ion acoustic wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Electron acoustic wave . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Korteweg-de Vries equation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Velocity distribution functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Scope of the thesis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Electron acoustic waves in unmagnetized plasmas

Electron acoustic waves in three component plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Linear dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Numerical results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Electron acoustic waves in four component plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Linear dispersion relation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Numerical results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Electron acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas

Electron acoustic waves in an electron-ion magnetoplasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Numerical results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Electron acoustic waves in four component magnetoplasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Numerical results and discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70

Ion acoustic waves in magnetized plasmas

Ion acoustic waves in electron ion plasma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Conclusions and future work

Electron and ion acoustic waves in space plasmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

Suggestion for the future work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

Space plasma environment

The Sun and the solar wind

Interplanetary magnetic field