Kinetic Effects of Rotational Discontinuities on Maxwellian and Non-Maxwellian plasmas

Rotational discontinuities (RDs) are considered in magnetohydrodynamics (MHD) as a kind of stable, persistent structure. As recent observations have shown, RDs may effectively describe the boundaries of switchbacks in the solar wind, around / inside which the plasma is highly dynamic and with phase space density variations. Because of the low collisionality of the solar wind, it may be worthwhile to revisit RDs with a kinetic approach. We therefore model the the plasma in RDs representing switchbacks with the state-of-the-art full-particle simulation code ECSim, and discuss the kinetic effects occurring in RD plasmas, including proton heating, anisotropy alternation, and modification of a core-beam composition, as well as the potential implications for the nature of switchbacks.