• Bulletin of the Korean Space Science Society
• /
• 2008.10a
• /
• pp.31.1-31.1
• /
• 2008

While some observations in the geomagnetic tail region supported electrons could be accelerated by reconnection processes, we still need more observation data to confirm electron acceleration in this region. Because most acceleration processes accompany strong pitch angle diffusion, if the electrons were accelerated in this region, strong energetic electron precipitation should be observed near earth on aurora oval. Even though there are several low altitude satellites observing electron precipitation, intense and small scale precipitation events have not been identified successfully. In this presentation, we will show an observation of strong energetic electron precipitation that might be analyzed by relativistic electron acceleration in the confined region. This event was observed by low altitude Korean STSAT-1, where intense several hundred keV electron precipitation was seen simultaneously with 10 keV electrons during storm time. In addition, we observed large magnetic field fluctuations and an ionospheric plasma depletion with FUV aurora emissions. Our observation implies relativistic electrons can be generated in the small area where Fermi acceleration might work.

• Vacuum Magazine
• /
• v.2 no.1
• /
• pp.17-20
• /
• 2015

In this article, a historical and scientific review on the development of an ultrafast electron microscope is supplied, and the challenges in further improvement of time resolution under sub-picosecond or even sub-femtosecond scale is reviewed. By combining conventional scanning electron microscope and femtosecond laser technique, an ultrafast electron microscope was invented. To overcome its temporal resolution limit which originates from chromatic aberration and Coulomb repulsion between individual electrons, a generation of electron pulse via strong-field photoemission has been investigated thoroughly. Recent studies reveal that the field enhancement and field accumulation associated with the near-field formation at sharply etched metal nanoprobe enabled such field emission by ordinary femtosecond laser irradiation. Moreover, a considerable acceleration reaching 20 eV with near-infrared laser and up to 300 eV acceleration with mid-infrared laser was observed, and the possibility to control the amount of acceleration by varying the incident laser pulse intensity and wavelength. Such findings are noteworthy because of the possibility of realizing a sub-femtosecond, few nanometer imaging of nanostructured sample.in silicon as thermoelectric materials.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
• /
• v.44 no.1
• /
• pp.49.1-49.1
• /
• 2019

Giant radio relics in the outskirts of galaxy clusters have been observed and they are interpreted as synchrotron emission from relativistic electrons accelerated via diffusive shock acceleration (DSA) in weak shocks of Ms < 3.0. In the DSA theory, the particle momentum should be greater than a few times the momentum of thermal protons to cross the shock transition and participate in the Fermi acceleration process. In the equilibrium, the momentum of thermal electrons is much smaller than the momentum of thermal protons, so electrons need to be pre-accelerated before they can go through DSA. To investigate such electron injection process, we study the electron pre-acceleration in weak quasi-perpendicular shocks (Ms = 2.0 - 3.0) in an ICM plasma (kT = 8.6 keV, beta = 100) through 2D particle-in-cell simulations. It is known that in quasi-perpendicular shocks, a substantial fraction of electrons could be reflected upstream, gain energy via shock drift acceleration (SDA), and generate oblique waves via the electron firehose instability (EFI), leading the energization of electrons through wave-particle interactions. We find that such kinetic processes are effective only in supercritical shocks above a critical Mach number, $Ms{\ast}{\sim}2.3$. In addition, even in shocks with Ms > 2.3, energized electrons may not reach high energies to be injected to DSA, because the oblique EFI alone fails to generate long-wavelength waves. Our results should have implications for the origin and nature of radio relics.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
• /
• v.45 no.1
• /
• pp.52.1-52.1
• /
• 2020

We propose semi-analytic models for the electron momentum distribution in weak shocks that accounts for both in situ acceleration and reacceleration through diffusive shock acceleration (DSA). In the former case, a small fraction of incoming electrons is assumed to be reflected at the shock ramp and pre-accelerated to the so-called injection momentum, pinj, above which particles can diffuse across the shock transition and participate in the DSA process. This leads to the DSA power-law distribution extending from the smallest momentum of reflected electrons, pref, all the way to the cutoff momentum, peq, constrained by radiative cooling. In the latter case, fossil electrons, specified by a power-law spectrum with a cutoff, are assumed to be re-accelerated from pref up to peq via DSA. We show that, in the in situ acceleration model, the amplitude of radio synchrotron emission depends strongly on the shock Mach number, whereas it varies rather weakly in the re-acceleration model.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
• /
• v.53 no.3
• /
• pp.59-67
• /
• 2020

We propose semi-analytic models for the electron momentum distribution in weak shocks that accounts for both in situ acceleration and re-acceleration through diffusive shock acceleration (DSA). In the former case, a small fraction of incoming electrons is assumed to be reflected at the shock ramp and pre-accelerated to the so-called injection momentum, p_inj, above which particles can diffuse across the shock transition and participate in the DSA process. This leads to the DSA power-law distribution extending from the smallest momentum of reflected electrons, p_ref, all the way to the cutoff momentum, p_eq, constrained by radiative cooling. In the latter case, fossil electrons, specified by a power-law spectrum with a cutoff, are assumed to be re-accelerated from p_ref up to p_eq via DSA. We show that, in the in situ acceleration model, the amplitude of radio synchrotron emission depends strongly on the shock Mach number, whereas it varies rather weakly in the re-acceleration model. Considering the rather turbulent nature of shocks in the intracluster medium, such extreme dependence for the in situ acceleration might not be compatible with the relatively smooth surface brightness of observed radio relics.

• Journal of the Optical Society of Korea
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.42-47
• /
• 2009

The propagation of an intense laser pulse through an upward density-gradient plasma in a self-modulated laser wakefield acceleration (SM-LWFA) is investigated by using particle-in-cell (PIC) simulations. In the fully relativistic and kinetic PIC simulations, the relativistic and kinetic effects including Landau damping enhance the electron dephasing. This electron dephasing is the most important factor for limiting the energy of accelerated electrons. However, the electron dephasing, which is enhanced by relativistic and kinetic effects in the homogeneous plasma, can be forestalled through the detuning process arising from the longitudinal density gradient. Simulation results show that the detuning process can effectively maintain the coherence of the laser wake wave in the spatiotemporal wakefield pattern, hence considerable energy enhancement is achievable. The spatiotemporal profiles are analyzed for the detailed study on the relativistic and kinetic effects. In this paper, the optimum slope of the density gradient for increasing electron energy is presented for various laser intensities.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
• /
• v.44 no.2
• /
• pp.55.2-55.2
• /
• 2019

The firehose instability is driven by a pressure anisotropy in a magnetized plasma when the temperature along the magnetic field is higher than the perpendicular temperature. Such condition occurs commonly in astrophysical and space environments, for instance, when there are beams aligned with the background magnetic field. Recently, it was argued that, in weak quasi-perpendicular shocks in the high-β intracluster medium (ICM), shock-reflected electrons propagating upstream cause the temperature anisotropy. This electron temperature anisotropy can trigger the electron firehose instability (EFI), which excites oblique waves in the shock foot. Scattering of electrons by these waves enables multiple cycles of shock drift acceleration (SDA) in the preshock region, leading to the electron injection to diffusive shock acceleration (DSA). In the study, the kinetic properties of the EFI are examined by the linear stability analysis based on the kinetic Vlasov-Maxwell theory and then further investigated by 2D Particle-in-Cell (PIC) simulations, especially focusing on those in high-β (β~100) plasmas. We then discuss the basic properties of the firehose instability, and the implication of our work on electron acceleration in ICM shock.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.49 no.6
• /
• pp.1114-1124
• /
• 2017

Acceleration/preconditioning strategies available in the SCEPTRE radiation transport code are described. A flexible transport synthetic acceleration (TSA) algorithm that uses a low-order discrete-ordinates ($S_N$) or spherical-harmonics ($P_N$) solve to accelerate convergence of a high-order $S_N$ source-iteration (SI) solve is described. Convergence of the low-order solves can be further accelerated by applying off-the-shelf incomplete-factorization or algebraic-multigrid methods. Also available is an algorithm that uses a generalized minimum residual (GMRES) iterative method rather than SI for convergence, using a parallel sweep-based solver to build up a Krylov subspace. TSA has been applied as a preconditioner to accelerate the convergence of the GMRES iterations. The methods are applied to several problems involving electron transport and problems with artificial cross sections with large scattering ratios. These methods were compared and evaluated by considering material discontinuities and scattering anisotropy. Observed accelerations obtained are highly problem dependent, but speedup factors around 10 have been observed in typical applications.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
• /
• v.21 no.2
• /
• pp.93-100
• /
• 2004

We have investigated characteristic solar wind dynamics associated with relativistic electron events at geosynchronous orbit. Most of the events for April, 1999 through December, 2002 are found to be accompanied by a prolonged solar quiet period which is characterized as low solar wind density, weak interplanetary magnetic field (IMF), and fast alfvenic fluctuations in IMF $B_z$. In a typical relativistic event, electron fluxes begin to increase by orders of magnitude when solar wind parameters drop to low values (e.g., $n_{sw}∼5 cm^{-3}$ and ｜$B_{IMF}$∼5 nT) after sharp peaks. Then the elevated electron fluxes stay at the high level during the solar quiet period. This observation may suggest the following scenario for the occurrence of a geosynchronous relativistic event: (ⅰ) Quiet solar winds can yield a stable and more dipole-like magnetospheric configurations in which the geosynchronous orbit locates well inside the trapping boundary of the energetic electrons. (ⅱ) If a large population of MeV electrons are generated (by whatever acceleration process(es)) in the inner magnetosphere, they can be trapped and effectively accumulated to a high intensity. (ⅲ) The high electron flux can persist for a number of days in the geosynchronous region as long as the solar wind dynamics stays quiet. Therefore the scenario indicates that the occurrence of a relativistic event would be a result of a delicate balance between the effects of electron acceleration and loss. In addition, the sensitive dependence of a relativistic event on the solar wind conditions makes the prediction of solar wind variability as important as understanding of electron acceleration processes in the forecast of a relativistic event.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
• /
• 2009.10a
• /
• pp.587-588
• /
• 2009