Universal power-law distribution functions in an electromagnetic kinetic plasma: implications for the inverted temperature profile in the solar corona

2025/08/11 by Uddipan Banik, A. Bhattacharjee, Banik, Uddipan +1
Physics and Astronomy · #Dust and Plasma Wave Phenomena #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Astrophysical Phenomena (astro-ph.HE) #Ionosphere and magnetosphere dynamics #Plasma Physics (physics.plasm-ph) #Solar and Space Plasma Dynamics #Solar and Stellar Astrophysics (astro-ph.SR) #Space Physics (physics.space-ph) #Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech)

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2508.08361

openalex publication_date 2025/08/11 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We develop a self-consistent quasilinear theory for the relaxation of electromagnetic kinetic plasmas, and demonstrate that the mean distribution functions of both electrons and ions tend to relax to a universal v^-5 tail. Large-scale electromagnetic (EM) fields efficiently accelerate the unscreened, fast particles but not the screened, slow ones. This non-thermal tail may arise in the solar corona from EM turbulence despite collisions, allowing suprathermal particles to escape the sun's gravity (velocity filtration) and inverting the temperature (T) profile with T rising to 10⁶ K.

Citations

• Universal fluctuation spectrum of Vlasov-Poisson turbulence
• Gravitational Turbulence: the Small-Scale Limit of the Cold-Dark-Matter Power Spectrum
• Relaxation to universal non-Maxwellian equilibria in a collisionless plasma
• Universal non-thermal power-law distribution functions from the self-consistent evolution of collisionless electrostatic plasmas
• Non-thermal particle acceleration and power-law tails via relaxation to universal Lynden-Bell equilibria

Cited by

• Collisionless relaxation to equilibrium distributions in cold dark matter halos: origin of the Navarro-Frenk-White profile

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