| Session Details | |
| Section | ST - Solar & Terrestrial Sciences |
| Session Title | Cross-scale Kinetic Processes in Magnetospheric Boundary Layers |
| Main Convener | Dr. Keizo Fujimoto (Beihang University, China) |
| Co-convener(s) | Dr. Dongsheng Cai (University of Tsukuba, Japan) Dr. Bertrand Lembege (National Centre for Scientific Research, France) Prof. Richard Sydora (University of Alberta, Canada) |
| Session Description | Planetary magnetosphere is a natural magnetic shield preventing the planetary atmosphere from direct interaction with solar wind. External and internal boundary layers of the magnetosphere play an important role in energy and momentum transport from the solar wind to the magnetosphere and between the regions with different origins in the magnetosphere. The boundary layers in collisionless plasma intrinsically involve multiscale kinetic processes coupled from the electron scales to the scale beyond the ion scales. The typical boundary layer processes include magnetic reconnection, collisionless shock, Kelvin-Helmholtz instability, auroral double layer, and so on. Such processes can have a significant impact on the formation and dynamics of the magnetosphere. So far, considerable efforts to understand the boundary layer processes and their impacts on the global processes have been carried out using large-scale (high-resolution) simulations (PIC, Vlasov, Hybrid, kinetic+MHD, etc.) and multi-satellite observations (MMS, Themis, Cluster, etc.) as well as laboratory experiments. However, there are still significant discrepancies in understanding from these different approaches. The purpose of this session is to put together and to compare the results from different approaches, such as numerical simulations, satellite observations, and laboratory experiments, and to clarify their advantages and limitations. This session mainly focuses on multiscale kinetic processes in the magnetopause, magnetotail, etc., and their impacts on the global dynamics of the planetary magnetosphere. Presentations on new technique for investigating the multiscale kinetic processes are also welcome. |