Possible manifestation of dusty ionospheric plasmas during high-speed meteor showers

Icarus. 2025. Vol. 429. Article 116383.

Izvekova Y. N., Попель С. И., Morozova T. I., Kopnin S. I.

We consider the formation of the periodic structures named dunes, which were observed during auroral events and were presented in the form of a set of almost horizontal stripes of green emission with an estimated period of 45 ± 14 km at some altitude in the altitude range of 90–110 km. Most observations of this event refer to October, the time when the high-speed meteor shower Draconids occurs. During high-speed meteor showers ablation of meteors in the lower ionosphere and subsequent condensation of the evaporated substance results in the formation of a dusty ionospheric plasma (Kopnin S.I. et al., Phys. Plasmas 16, 063705 (2009)). At the altitudes of about 100 km the modulational instability in dusty plasmas can develop leading to an appearance and growth of dust acoustic waves. If the growth is not compensated by other effects at early stage, the wave perturbations can become intensive enough to form a nonlinear periodic wave structure. We show that the formation of the dunes observed in the altitude range of 90–110 km during the period of Draconids meteor shower can be associated with such nonlinear periodic dust acoustic wave structures.

Ключевые слова: Пылевая плазма, Dusty plasmas, Dunes, Meteor showers, Nonlinear wave structures, Earth’s dusty ionosphere, метеорные потоки, запыленная ионосфера Земли, нелинейные волновые структуры, дюны