Document Type

Article

Publication Date

9-29-2011

Publication Title

Annales Geophysicae

Department

Department of Physics and Astronomy

Abstract

A simple mechanism for the generation of elec- tromagnetic “Zebra” pattern emissions is proposed. “Zebra” bursts are regularly spaced narrow-band radio emissions on the otherwise broadband radio continuum emitted by the ac- tive solar corona. The mechanism is based on the generation of an ion-ring distribution in a magnetic mirror geometry in the presence of a properly directed field-aligned electric po- tential field. Such ion-rings or ion-conics are well known from magnetospheric observations. Under coronal condi- tions they may become weakly relativistic. In this case the ion-cyclotron maser generates a number of electromagnetic ion-cyclotron harmonics which modulate the electron maser emission. The mechanism is capable of switching the emis- sion on and off or amplifying it quasi-periodically which is a main feature of the observations.

DOI

10.5194/angeo-29-1673-2011

Download
COinS