Dependence of kinetic plasma waves on ion-to-electron mass ratio and light-to-Alfvén speed ratio

Abstract

The magnetization $|Ω_{\mathrm e}|/ω_{\mathrm{e}}$ is an important parameter in plasma astrophysics, where $Ω_{\mathrm e}$ and $ω_{\mathrm{e}}$ are the electron gyro-frequency and electron plasma frequency, respectively. It only depends on the mass ratio $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ and the light-to-Alfvén speed ratio $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$, where $m_{\mathrm i}$ ($m_{\mathrm e}$) is the ion (electron) mass, $c$ is the speed of light, and $v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$ is the ion Alfvén speed. Nonlinear numerical plasma models such as particle-in-cell simulations must often assume unrealistic values for $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ and for $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$. Because linear theory yields exact results for parametric scalings of wave properties at small amplitudes, we use linear theory to investigate the dispersion relations of Alfvén/ion-cyclotron and fast-magnetosonic/whistler waves as prime examples for collective plasma behaviour depending on $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ and $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$. We analyse their dependence on $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ and $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$ in quasi-parallel and quasi-perpendicular directions of propagation with respect to the background magnetic field for a plasma with $β_j\sim1$, where $β_j$ is the ratio of the thermal to magnetic pressure for species $j$. Although their dispersion relations are largely independent of $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$ for $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}\gtrsim 10$, the mass ratio $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ has a strong effect at scales smaller than the ion inertial length. Moreover, we study the impact of relativistic electron effects on the dispersion relations. Based on our results, we recommend aiming for a more realistic value of $m_{\mathrm i}/m_{\mathrm e}$ than for a more realistic value of $c/v_{\mathrm{Ai}}$ in non-relativistic plasma simulations if such a choice is necessary, although $\dots$