Temperature of solid particles in colloidal plasmas in space

Abstract

Lehnert (1970) has investigated the question of the relationship between the kinetic temperature and the internal temperature at which a solid coexists with a plasma in a thermal steady state. The reported investigation is a more refined version of Lehnert's preliminary analysis of this relationship. The electric potential of grains is considered along with the ambient radiation field and the grain temperatures in the thermal steady state. An illustrative calculation is conducted of the grain temperatures in the dense regions of the primordial circumsolar colloidal plasma envelope such as envisioned in the Alfven-Arrhenius model (1976) of the origin of the solar system. It is shown that under certain conditions the solid grains can coexist with the plasma phase up to fairly high plasma densities and temperatures.