Particle-In-Cell Simulation on the Characteristics of a Receiving Antenna in Space Plasma Environment.

We applied the electromagnetic Particle-In-Cell simulation to the analysis of receiving antenna characteristics in space plasma environment. In the analysis, we set up external waves in a simulation region and receive them with a numerical antenna model placed in the simulation region. Using this method, we evaluated the effective length of electric field antennas used for plasma wave investigations conducted by scientific spacecraft. We particularly focused on the effective length of an electric field instrument called MEFISTO for a future mission to Mercury: BepiColombo. We first confirmed that the effective length of the MEFISTO-type antenna is basically longer than that of a simple dipole antenna for both electrostatic and electromagnetic plasma waves. By applying the principle of a voltmeter, the effective length of the MEFISTO-type antenna is predicted to become identical to the separation between two sensor-conductor’s midpoints. However, the numerical result revealed that the actual effective length becomes shorter than the prediction, which is caused by the shorting-out effect due to the presence of a center boom conductor between the two sensor conductors. Since the above effect is difficult to treat theoretically, the present numerical method is a powerful tool for further quantitative evaluation of the antenna characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]