Numerical solutions for time-dependent hydrodynamic flow with mass loading

The flow of a magnetized collisionless plasma can to a large extent be treated in terms of hydrodynamics. If in addition to the plasma neutral particles are present which are added to the flow by some ionization process, a “mass loading” of the plasma takes place. In this letter we investigate with the aid of an appropriate numerical code the time-dependent solutions of this problem in a one-dimensional geometry. Extensive computer experiments reveal that, depending on the initial conditions, there exists a variety of qualitatively different solutions. Only in certain cases the solutions approach a steady state.