Combined Scattering of Outer Radiation Belt Electrons by Simultaneously Occurring Chorus, Exohiss, and Magnetosonic Waves

We report a typical event that fast magnetosonic (MS) waves, exohiss, and two-band chorus waves occurred simultaneously on the dayside observed by Van Allen Probes on 25 December 2013. By combining calculations of electron diffusion coefficients and 2-D Fokker-Planck diffusion simulations, we quantitatively analyze the combined scattering effect of multiple waves to demonstrate that the net impact of combined scattering does not simply depend on the wave intensity dominance of various plasma waves. Although the observed MS waves are most intense, the electron butterfly distribution is inhibited by exohiss and chorus, and electrons are considerably accelerated by combined scattering of MS and chorus waves. The simulated electron pitch angle distributions exhibit the variation trend consistent with the observations. Our results strongly suggest that competition and cooperation between resonant interactions with concurrently occurring magnetospheric waves need to be carefully treated in modeling and comprehending the radiation belt electron dynamics. Plain Language Summary It has been acknowledged that wave-particle interactions play an important role in energy exchange between plasma waves and radiation belt electrons. Most previous studies focused on the wave-particle interaction effect of individual wave modes, while only rather limited investigations look into the competition and cooperation between various kinds of plasma waves upon their modulation of the radiation belt electron dynamics. In the present study, we report a typical event that magnetosonic waves, exohiss, and two-band chorus waves occurred simultaneously on the dayside. By computations of the electron diffusion coefficients and 2-D Fokker-Planck diffusion simulations, we have found that the competition and cooperation between these three wave modes are delicate in that the net combined scattering impact does not simply depend on the dominance of wave intensity but requires careful analyses via diffusion simulations. Our results demonstrate the importance of incorporating the combined scattering effect by various simultaneously occurring magnetospheric waves during modeling and comprehending the complex radiation belt electron dynamics.