Beschreibung:
Abstract. The Voyager plasma observations show that the physics of the heliosheath is rather complex and that the temperaturederived from observation particularly differs from expectations. To explain this fact, the temperature in the heliosheath should be based onκ distributions instead of Maxwellians because the former allows for much higher temperature. Here we show an easy way tocalculate the κ temperatures when those estimated from the data are given as Maxwellian temperatures. We use the moments ofthe Maxwellian and κ distributions to estimate the κ temperature. Moreover, we show that the pressure (temperature)given by a truncated κ distribution is similar to that given by a Maxwellian and only starts to increase for higher truncationvelocities. We deduce a simple formula to convert the Maxwellian to κ pressure or temperature. We apply this result to theVoyager 2 observations in the heliosheath. Keywords. Space plasma physics (kinetic and MHD theory)