Numerical Simulation of the Super Fine Electron Current Sheet in the Near Magnetotail

The paper describes the numerical simulation of quasi-stationary configurations of current sheets with a given normal component of the magnetic-field, which consists of a thin ion current sheet and its embedded super thin electron current sheet. These sheets were regularly observed during the pre-storm phase of magnetospheric substorms by the MMS satellite mission in the neutral sheet of the near magnetotail of the Earth. A new numerical model is proposed of a stationary current sheet with kinetic description of transient ion populations and electrons forming it, for which the Vlasov equations are solved by the method of characteristics for stationary case and the distribution functions are calculated on regular grids in velocity space, the real charge-to-mass ratio for electrons being taken into account. This model was used to obtain planar symmetric configurations of the super thin current sheet, which agree qualitatively and quantitatively with MMS spacecraft observations.