Collisionless stationary states of a stratified plasma in an expanding magnetic tube with stochastic heating
Abstract
We investigate the collisionless kinetic structure of the upper solar atmosphere in an expanding magnetic field. Building on established velocity-filtration models, we extend the stochastic multi-temperature framework developed in previous works by including magnetic-field expansion and magnetic-moment conservation. Stochastic heating generates a non-Maxwellian boundary distribution through the superposition of particle populations associated with different temperatures. We consider a stationary two-component plasma confined within an expanding magnetic flux tube and subject to gravity, self-consistent electrostatic interactions, the Pannekoek--Rosseland electric field, and magnetic-moment conservation. Starting from the Vlasov equation, we derive fully analytical expressions for the distribution functions, density, and parallel, perpendicular, and total temperature profiles. The combined conservation of energy and magnetic moment generates a loss-cone distribution, reducing the density relative to the unmagnetized case and producing temperature anisotropy. For a single-temperature boundary, the competition between gravity and magnetic-moment conservation produces a maximum in the parallel temperature, for which we derive and numerically validate analytical scaling laws. With stochastic heating, gravitational filtering enhances the contribution of hotter populations at coronal heights, while magnetic-moment conservation amplifies the velocity-space anisotropy. Our analytical solution provides a collisionless benchmark for future kinetic models incorporating more realistic magnetic-field geometries, Coulomb collisions, and turbulent particle scattering.
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BibTeX
@misc{barbieri2026collisionless,
title = {{Collisionless stationary states of a stratified plasma in an expanding magnetic tube with stochastic heating}},
author = {Luca Barbieri and Pascal Démoulin and Daniel Verscharen},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2607.21313},
eprint = {2607.21313},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.21313},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Collisionless stationary states of a stratified plasma in an expanding magnetic tube with stochastic heating
AU - Luca Barbieri
AU - Pascal Démoulin
AU - Daniel Verscharen
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/05
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2607.21313
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.21313
AB - We investigate the collisionless kinetic structure of the upper solar atmosphere in an expanding magnetic field. Building on established velocity-filtration models, we extend the stochastic multi-temperature framework developed in previous works by including magnetic-field expansion and magnetic-moment conservation. Stochastic heating generates a non-Maxwellian boundary distribution through the superposition of particle populations associated with different temperatures. We consider a stationary two-component plasma confined within an expanding magnetic flux tube and subject to gravity, self-consistent electrostatic interactions, the Pannekoek--Rosseland electric field, and magnetic-moment conservation. Starting from the Vlasov equation, we derive fully analytical expressions for the distribution functions, density, and parallel, perpendicular, and total temperature profiles. The combined conservation of energy and magnetic moment generates a loss-cone distribution, reducing the density relative to the unmagnetized case and producing temperature anisotropy. For a single-temperature boundary, the competition between gravity and magnetic-moment conservation produces a maximum in the parallel temperature, for which we derive and numerically validate analytical scaling laws. With stochastic heating, gravitational filtering enhances the contribution of hotter populations at coronal heights, while magnetic-moment conservation amplifies the velocity-space anisotropy. Our analytical solution provides a collisionless benchmark for future kinetic models incorporating more realistic magnetic-field geometries, Coulomb collisions, and turbulent particle scattering.
ER -