Goldstein, MelvynEviatar, Aharon2023-11-022023-11-021973-01Goldstein, Melvyn L., and Aharon Eviatar. “Turbulent Heating of Colliding Streams in the Solar Wind.” The Astrophysical Journal 179 (January 1, 1973): 627–36. https://doi.org/10.1086/151901.http://hdl.handle.net/11603/30495Turbulent heating of colliding plasma streams has previously been observed in the solar wind. The original data were interpreted in terms of a fluid model. We argue that a plasma-kinctic description is the more appropriate theoretical approach and is necessary in order to better understand the microscopic physical phenomena that underlie all fluid models. We used microscopic solar-wind parameters characteristic of conditions during the observations, together with the quasi-linear plasma-kinetic theory, to compute the expected magnetic field and temperature enhancements in the interaction region between two counterstreaming plasma beams. The physical mechanism of excitation is the electromagnetic two-stream instability in which Alfve'n waves are unstable. We compute a total field in the interaction region of B ∼ 8 γ (10-12 γ is observed) and a change in temperature of ΔT ∼ 1 x 10⁵ ° K is observed). Other features of the observations are discussed in terms of a plasma-kinetic theory.10 pagesen-USThis item is likely protected under Title 17 of the U.S. Copyright Law. Unless on a Creative Commons license, for uses protected by Copyright Law, contact the copyright holder or the author.Text