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  • Ion versus Electron Heating...
    Kawazura, Y.; Schekochihin, A. A.; Barnes, M.; TenBarge, J. M.; Tong, Y.; Klein, K. G.; Dorland, W.

    Physical review. X, 12/2020, Letnik: 10, Številka: 4
    Journal Article

    The partition of irreversible heating between ions and electrons in compressively driven (but subsonic) collisionless turbulence is investigated by means of nonlinear hybrid gyrokinetic simulations. We derive a prescription for the ion-to-electron heating ratioQi/Qeas a function of the compressive-to-Alfvénic driving power ratioPcompr/PAW, of the ratio of ion thermal pressure to magnetic pressureβi, and of the ratio of ion-to-electron background temperaturesTi/Te. It is shown thatQi/Qeis an increasing function ofPcompr/PAW. When the compressive driving is sufficiently large,Qi/Qeapproaches≃Pcompr/PAW. This indicates that, in turbulence with large compressive fluctuations, the partition of heating is decided at the injection scales, rather than at kinetic scales. Analysis of phase-space spectra shows that the energy transfer from inertial-range compressive fluctuations to sub-Larmor-scale kinetic Alfvén waves is absent for both low and highβi, meaning that the compressive driving is directly connected to the ion-entropy fluctuations, which are converted into ion thermal energy. This result suggests that preferential electron heating is a very special case requiring lowβiand no, or weak, compressive driving. Our heating prescription has wide-ranging applications, including to the solar wind and to hot accretion disks such as M87 and Sgr A*.