Speaker
Description
Plasma dynamics at the Earth's magnetospheric flanks are strongly influenced by the Kelvin-Helmholtz instability (KHI), which arises from velocity shear between the solar wind and magnetospheric plasma. This instability leads to the formation of vortices that drive a variety of plasma phenomena, including plasma mixing and magnetic reconnection. Through these processes, KHI facilitates the transfer of energy, momentum, and particles across the magnetopause, playing a key role in plasma transport and particle acceleration.
To investigate the small-scale physics of these processes, we performed high-resolution two-dimensional (2D) fully kinetic particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations using the iPic3D and ECsim codes. By examining the particle velocity distribution functions and temperature anisotropies, we analyze the microphysical processes driving plasma mixing and the onset of turbulent mixing layers. The energy-conserving capabilities of the ECsim code provide an accurate representation of kinetic dynamics, enabling detailed studies of electron-scale phenomena and magnetic reconnection within the KHI-induced mixing layer.
