# Plasma turbulence in the equatorial electrojet: A two-dimensional Hamiltonian fluid model

## TL;DR

This paper develops a Hamiltonian fluid model for the equatorial electrojet, capturing plasma instabilities and revealing how key parameters influence the dynamics of plasma turbulence.

## Contribution

It introduces a nonlinear, Hamiltonian fluid model for the electrojet that includes key plasma instabilities and identifies geometric invariants and the roles of specific parameters.

## Key findings

- Model captures Farley-Buneman and gradient-drift instabilities.
- Identifies Casimir invariants as constants of motion.
- Shows how density-gradient scale-length and drift velocity control instability dynamics.

## Abstract

A nonlinear unified fluid model that describes the Equatorial Electrojet, including the Farley-Buneman and gradient-drift plasma instabilities, is defined and shown to be a noncanonical Hamiltonian system. Two geometric constants of motion for the model are obtained and shown to be Casimir invariants. A reformulation of the model shows the roles of the density-gradient scale-length ($L_n$) and the cross-field drift-velocity (${\upsilon}_E$) in controlling the dynamics of unstable modes in the growing, transition, and saturation phases of a simulation.