Ion-acoustic enhancements generated by beam-plasma instability in an auroral cavity

Abstract

This article demonstrates the generation of enhanced ion-acoustic waves by beam-plasma instability in a density cavity. The self-consistent equations of weak turbulence theory that include quasi-linear, decay, and scattering processes as well as convective and dispersive effects are numerically solved for a one-dimensional density cavity. It is shown that significant enhancements of ion-acoustic waves occur in the presence of counterstreaming electron beams and that the enhanced ion-acoustic waves are initially localized near the center of the density cavity at large wavelengths. Later in the evolution, the enhancement in the spectrum of ion-acoustic waves spreads out toward the edges of the cavity, with a shift to smaller wavelengths, while the enhancement near the center of the cavity tends to decrease in magnitude. The significance of the present findings is discussed. Copyright 2011 by the American Geophysical Union.