Properties and selected implications of magnetic turbulence for interstellar medium, Local Bubble and solar wind

TL;DR

This paper reviews the fundamental properties of magnetic turbulence in astrophysical environments like the interstellar medium, Local Bubble, and solar wind, emphasizing the importance of non-numerical approaches and observational data.

Contribution

It highlights the limitations of purely numerical methods in understanding magnetic turbulence and discusses environment-dependent variations and observational strategies.

Findings

Magnetic turbulence varies significantly across different astrophysical environments.

Intermittent plasma heating is influenced by turbulence.

Observational methods like Sodium atom alignment can probe interplanetary turbulence.

Abstract

Astrophysical fluids, including interstellar and interplanetary medium, are magnetized and turbulent. Their appearance, evolution, and overall properties are determined by the magnetic turbulence that stirs it. We argue that examining magnetic turbulence at a fundamental level is vital to understanding many processes. A point that frequently escapes the attention of researchers is that magnetic turbulence cannot be confidently understood only using "brute force" numerical approaches. In this review we illustrate this point on a number of examples, including intermittent heating of plasma by turbulence, interactions of turbulence with cosmic rays and effects of turbulence on the rate of magnetic reconnection. We show that the properties of magnetic turbulence may vary considerably in various environments, e.g. imbalanced turbulence in solar wind differs from balanced turbulence and both of these differ from turbulence in partially ionized gas. Appealing for the necessity of more observational data on magnetic fields, we discuss a possibility of studying interplanetary turbulence using alignment of Sodium atoms in the tail of comets.