SH054-07
Switchbacks: statistical properties and deviation from alfvenicity
Wednesday, 16 December 2020: 12:18
Virtual
Andrea Larosa1, Vladimir Krasnoselskikh2, Thierry Dudok de Wit2, Oleksiy V Agapitov3, Clara Froment4, vamsee Krishna Jagarlamudi5,6, Stuart Bale7, John W Bonnell8, Anthony W Case9, K. Goetz10, Peter Harvey11, Justin Christophe Kasper12, Kelly E Korreck9, Davin E Larson13, Roberto Livi14, Robert J MacDowall15, David Malaspina16, Michel Moncuquet17, Forrest Mozer7, Marc Pulupa14, Claire Revillet18, Michael Louis Stevens9 and Phyllis L Whittlesey14, (1)Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace, Orléans Cedex 2, France, (2)LPC2E, CNRS and University of Orléans, Orléans, France, (3)Space Science Laboratory, UCB, Berkeley, CA, United States, (4)University of Oslo, Institute of Theoretical Astrophysics, Oslo, Norway, (5)LPC2E, Orleans, France, (6)IAPS-INAF, Rome, Italy, (7)University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, United States, (8)University of California, Berkeley, Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States, (9)Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Cambridge, MA, United States, (10)University of Minnesota Twin Cities, Minnesota Institute of Astrophysics, Minneapolis, MN, United States, (11)Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, United States, (12)University of Michigan, Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, MI, United States, (13)Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States, (14)Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, United States, (15)NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, United States, (16)University of Colorado, Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences Department, Boulder, CO, United States, (17)LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, Université PSL, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Université de Paris, Meudon, France, (18)CNRS and University of Orléans, LPC2E, Orléans, France
Abstract:
Switchbacks are probably the most prominent features observed by Parker Solar Probe during its first encounter with the Sun. These magnetic structures with reversed polarity have well defined boundaries, higher proton velocity with respect to the surrounding plasma, enhanced wave activity inside the structures and at the boundaries. Their duration varies from a few seconds to tens of minutes.
We present an extensive statistical study of their properties, with a particular focus on their boundaries: orientation, type of discontinuity, presence of wave activity, velocity orientation with respect to the boundaries, and Poynting flux. We show that even though they are commonly considered as Alfvénic structures a small percentage of them show slow and fast mode-like correlations between the magnetic field and the proton density.
