A Predicted Small and Round Heliosphere

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel magnetohydrodynamic model that predicts a smaller, rounder heliosphere by accounting for pick-up ions and their interactions, aligning well with spacecraft and energetic neutral atom observations.

Contribution

The paper presents a new MHD model treating pick-up ions as a separate fluid, improving predictions of heliosphere shape and magnetic field data compared to previous models.

Findings

The heliosphere is smaller and rounder than previously modeled.

The model aligns with Voyager and Cassini observations.

PUIs depletion cools and deflates the heliosphere downstream of the termination shock.

Abstract

The shape of the solar wind bubble within the interstellar medium, the so-called heliosphere, has been explored over six decades. As the Sun moves through the surrounding partially-ionized medium, neutral hydrogen atoms penetrate the heliosphere, and through charge-exchange with the supersonic solar wind, create a population of hot pick-up ions (PUIs). The Termination Shock (TS) crossing by Voyager 2 (V2) data demonstrated that the heliosheath (HS) (the region of shocked solar wind) pressure is dominated by suprathermal particles. Here we use a novel magnetohydrodynamic model that treats the freshly ionized PUIs as a separate fluid from the thermal component of the solar wind. Unlike previous models, the new model reproduces the properties of the PUIs and solar wind ions based on the New Horizon and V2 spacecraft observations. The PUIs charge exchange with the cold neutral H atoms of the ISM in the HS and are quickly depleted. The depletion of PUIs cools the heliosphere downstream of the TS, "deflating" it and leading to a narrower HS and a smaller and rounder shape, in agreement with energetic neutral atom observations by the Cassini spacecraft. The new model, with interstellar magnetic field orientation constrained by the IBEX ribbon, reproduces the magnetic field data outside the HP at Voyager 1(V1). We present the predictions for the magnetic field outside the HP at V2.