Heating of the background plasma by obliquely propagating Alfven waves excited in the electromagnetic alpha/proton instability.

Previous studies have shown that obliquely propagating Alfven waves may be excited in the electromagnetic alpha/proton instability. In this paper, two-dimensional hybrid simulations are performed to investigate the nonlinear evolution of the electromagnetic alpha/proton instability. We further find that the obliquely propagating Alfven waves excited by the alpha/proton instability have nearly linear polarization. The background proton component, as well as the alpha component, can be resonantly heated by the oblique Alfven waves. The implications of our results to the unsolved solar coronal hearing problem are also discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]