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Ann. Geophys., 21, 1153-1157, 2003
www.ann-geophys.net/21/1153/2003/
© European Geosciences Union 2003
Collisional Rayleigh-Taylor instability and shear-flow in equatorial Spread-F plasma
N. Chakrabarti1 and G. S. Lakhina2
1Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, 1/AF, Bidhannagar, Kolkata- 700 064, India
2Indian Institute of Geomagnetism, Dr. Nannabhai Moos Marg, Colaba, Mumbai – 400 05, India
Abstract. Collisional Rayleigh-Taylor
(RT) instability is considered in the bottom side of the equatorial F-region.
By a novel nonmodal calculation it is shown that for an applied shear flow in
equilibrium, the growth of the instability is considerably reduced. Finite but
small amounts of diffusion enhances the stabilization process. The results may
be relevant to the observations of long-lived irregularities at the bottom-side
of the F-layer.
Key words. Ionosphere (ionospheric
irregularities, equatorial ionosphere, plasma waves and instabilities)
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