Intermittencies and Local Heating in Magnetic Cloud Boundary Layers

Abstract

We perform a statistical study on the intermittency and the associated local heating in the front boundary layers (BLs) of 74 magnetic clouds (MCs). The intermittent structures are identified by the partial variance of increments (PVI) method. The probability distribution function of PVI-values reveals that the BLs are more intermittent than adjacent sheath regions, and they contain a greater concentration of strong intermittencies. These strong intermittencies are accompanied by local enhancement of the proton temperature, while the enhancement is not prominent at weaker intermittencies inside the BLs. Since the strong intermittencies are associated with magnetic reconnection (MR) processes according to previous studies, these results indicate that MR processes may account for the local heating in the MCBLs to a large extent.