Whistler Waves Driven by Field-Aligned Streaming Electrons in the Near-Earth Magnetotail Reconnection

We analyze Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission observations of whistler waves and associated electron field-aligned crescent distribution in the vicinity of the magnetotail near-Earth X-line. The whistler waves propagate outward from the X-line in the neutral sheet. The associated field-aligned streaming electrons exhibit a crescent-like shape, with an inverse slope (df/d|v_|||>0) at 1–5 keV. The parallel phase velocity of the waves is in the range (1–5 keV) of the inverse slope of the field-aligned crescents in the velocity space. We demonstrate that the observed whistler waves are driven by the electron field-aligned crescents through Landau resonance. The cyclotron resonance is at the high-energy tail with negligible free energy of pitch angle anisotropy in these events.