Thermalization of solar wind

Three kinetic equations describing the linear and non-linear wave-particle interaction for an anisotropic solar wind plasma have been developed. These equations have been solved numerically to find the variation inT /T with respect to time, whereT andT are the perpendicular and parallel temperatures with respect to the ambient magnetic field of the solar wind. For wave energy greater than a critical value (strong turbulence), non-linear wave-particle interactions are important but do not lead to thermalization. On the other hand, weak nonlinear interactions tend to increaseT /T , but make only a negligible contribution in the quantitative sense. Thus, only the linear wave-particle interaction remains as the significant contributer to the increase ofT /T .