Scripts and data files required to reproduce the figures in the paper "Plasma frequency waves in Earth's electron foreshock" by D. B. Graham, et al.
Context. At Earth's quasi-perpendicular bow shock, electrons can be reflected and accelerated to high velocities, forming suprathermal beams. These beams excite Langmuir and beam-mode waves, which can then be converted to radio waves via linear or nonlinear processes.
Aims. We aim to understand the properties and evolution of Langmuir waves excited in the electron foreshock region using the Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission.
Methods. We use fields and particle data from the four MMS spacecraft to investigate the properties and occurrence of Langmuir/Z-mode waves in Earth's electron foreshock. MMS provides extended high-resolution snapshots of the three-dimensional electric field, enabling detailed analysis of wave properties. Probability distribution functions of the electric field are used to investigate the evolution of the waves and the role of density fluctuations.
Results. Distinct spectral peaks near the electron plasma frequency are often observed, suggestive of simultaneous observations of beam-mode and Langmuir waves, as well as nonlinear electrostatic decay of Langmuir waves or reflection off density gradients. In addition, the electric fields often have large perpendicular components, consistent with low wave number Z-mode waves. The statistical results show that the electric fields are largest near the electron foreshock boundary with the solar wind. Both the parallel and perpendicular components of the electric field exhibit close to log-normal probability distribution functions, consistent with predictions from Stochastic Growth Theory.
Conclusions. These results suggest that small-scale density perturbations in the ambient plasma, in addition to nonlinear three-wave decay, are crucial to the evolution of Langmuir waves and the generation of radio waves at the plasma frequency and second harmonic. These results apply to Langmuir waves in the solar wind, such as in Type II and Type III solar radio burst source regions, where the same density fluctuations are expected and large-amplitude Langmuir waves with similar properties are observed.
The irfu-matlab software package (https://github.com/irfu/irfu-matlab) is required for the scripts performing analysis on MMS data.
The data used from the MMS spacecraft are publically available at https://lasp.colorado.edu/mms/sdc/public/about/browse-wrapper/ or https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/mms/