Charged dust grain dynamics subject to solar wind, Poynting-Robertson drag, and the interplanetary magnetic field

TL;DR

This paper develops a secular theory for charged dust grain dynamics in the solar system, showing how the interplanetary magnetic field can counteract solar wind and Poynting-Robertson drag effects, affecting dust grain orbital evolution.

Contribution

It introduces a new secular theory incorporating magnetic field effects and validates it with numerical simulations, revealing conditions for orbital stabilization.

Findings

Magnetic field influences semi-major axis depending on charge and field sign.

Magnetic effects can counteract solar wind and Poynting-Robertson drag.

Derived conditions for orbital stabilization based on magnetic and dust parameters.

Abstract

We investigate the combined effect of solar wind, Poynting-Robertson drag, and the frozen-in interplanetary magnetic field on the motion of charged dust grains in our solar system. For this reason we derive a secular theory of motion by the means of averaging method and validate it with numerical simulations of the un-averaged equations of motions. The theory predicts that the secular motion of charged particles is mainly affected by the z-component of the solar magnetic axis, or the normal component of the interplanetary magnetic field. The normal component of the interplanetary magnetic field leads to an increase or decrease of semi-major axis depending on its functional form and sign of charge of the dust grain. It is generally accepted that the combined effects of solar wind and photon absorption and re-emmision (Poynting-Robertson drag) lead to a decrease in semi-major axis on secular time scales. On the contrary, we demonstrate that the interplanetary magnetic field may counteract these drag forces under certain circumstances. We derive a simple relation between the parameters of the magnetic field, the physical properties of the dust grain as well as the shape and orientation of the orbital ellipse of the particle, which is a necessary conditions for the stabilization in semi-major axis.