Downstream extent of Venus’s far-tail plasma boundary

Determine how far downstream Venus’s bow shock (or bow wave) or any other permanent plasma boundary produced by the solar wind interaction with Venus extends beyond the planet, in order to establish the ultimate length and persistence of Venus’s induced magnetotail boundary structure.

Background

The paper synthesizes nine flybys by Solar Orbiter, BepiColombo, and Parker Solar Probe, many of which traversed Venus’s far magnetotail. Prior empirical boundary models were constrained within about 5 R_V by Venus Express, and earlier datasets provided only a handful of crossings to ~15 R_V. Before these recent flybys, the far-downstream extent of any permanent boundary (e.g., bow shock or bow wave) formed by the solar wind interaction with Venus had not been established.

The authors report bow shock or bow wave signatures at least to 60 R_V downstream and discuss an uncertain candidate as far as ~104 R_V, but emphasize that the overall far-tail extent of a persistent boundary remained unknown at the outset and is only partly constrained by the available flybys.