[Baps] MIT EAPS DLS Talk, Tomorrow Weds October 10, Dr. Jacob Bortnik, 4:00 pm in 54-915

[Kerri Cahoy]

MIT EAPS DLS Talk October 10, 4:00 pm in 54-915

Dr. Jacob Bortnik

Department of Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences
University of California at Los Angeles

“Nonlinear Wave-particle Interactions and Radiation Belt Dynamics: A
drunken walk to the bleeding edge.”

Although nonlinear interactions between energetic particles and
magnetospheric plasma waves have been described and theoretically
treated essentially since the beginning of the space age, this class
of wave-particle interaction has recently gained in prominence in the
radiation belt modeling community. This is due to the fact that
quasilinear theory, which is extensively used and was originally
developed to describe interactions with broadband, incoherent, weak
waves, is now being increasingly applied to intense, coherent,
narrowband waves, i.e., outside of its strict domain of applicability.
On the other hand, global radiation belt modelers do not have many (or
any) options for including nonlinear behavior into their codes. Faced
with this conundrum, we show some recent work that tries to bridge the
two opposing paradigms of test-particle simulations and quaslinear
theory. We begin with a brief review of nonlinear interaction
principles, and conclude with some open problems and ideas that will
be of particular interest as we move into the RBSP era.

-- 
Kerri Cahoy
Assistant Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 37-367
77 Massachusetts Ave.
Cambridge, MA 02139, USA
Cell phone: 650 814-8148
Office phone: 617 324-6005
E-mail: kcahoy at mit.edu, kerri.cahoy at gmail.com