Radiation Pressure Acting on the Neutral He Atoms in the Heliosphere

Abstract

Abstract Interstellar neutral helium (ISN He) is an important source of information on the physical state of the local interstellar medium. Radiation pressure acting on the neutral helium atoms in the heliosphere has always been neglected; its effect has been considered insignificant compared to gravitational force. The most advanced numerical models of ISN He take into account more and more subtle effects; therefore, it is important to check if the effect of radiation pressure is still negligible. In this paper, we use the most up-to-date version of the Warsaw Test Particle Model (WTPM) to calculate the expected helium distribution in the heliosphere and simulate the flux of the ISN He observed by the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) and in the future by the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP). We compare results calculated with and without radiation pressure during low and high solar activity. The results show that in the analysis of IBEX-Lo observations, the radiation pressure acting on typical helium causes flux differences at a level of 1%–4% and is comparable to the observational errors. For the more sensitive IMAP-Lo instrument, there are some regions in the considered observation configurations where radiation pressure causes potentially statistically significant changes in the calculated fluxes. The effect can be up to 9% for the indirect beam and is likely to be higher than the estimated errors. Therefore, we claim that in the future analysis of the IMAP-Lo observations, radiation pressure acting on ISN He should be considered.