MHD effects in the venus magnetosheath including mass loading Original Research Article

We use the “magnetic string” approach to integrate the dissipationless MHD equations for a 3-D flow around planetary obstacles, and apply it to some aspects of the flow in the magnetosheath of Venus. Our method has both analytical and numerical components, and is particularly suited to study the structure of the magnetic barrier (depletion layer). Including pick-up processes, we study the contribution to the structure of the Venus magnetosheath made by the pick-up ions. As one main conclusion, we show that the used method leads to a stand-off bow shock position which in good agreement with observations.