Effect of Intermittent Structures on Electron Heating in Saturn's Magnetosphere: Cassini Observations

Abstract

Abstract In Saturn's magnetosphere, the plasma temperature increases with radial distance, requiring a heating mechanism to counteract the adiabatic cooling effect of expanding plasma. To explore potential heating source, we perform a statistical study about intermittent structures and intermittent heating in Saturn's magnetosphere based on the observations from the Cassini spacecraft. Partial Variance of Increments (PVI) technique is used to measure the intermittency of magnetic field and identify the intermittent structures. It is found that the electron temperature has a rising trend as the increase of magnetic field intermittency, implying the occurrence of electron heating in the intermittent structures. Additionally, the turbulence heating rate also exhibits an increasing trend as the increase of probability density of intermittent structures. Our results evidence the effect of intermittent heating in the Saturn's magnetosphere, and suggest that intermittent structures with high magnetic field intermittency play an important role in turbulence heating.