Dust destruction and ion formation in the inner solar system

We suggest that dust-dust collisions feed ions into the interplanetary medium and produce a significant amount of the heavy inner-source pickup ions detected by the Solar Wind Ion Composition Spectrometer aboard the Ulysses spacecraft. Organic refractory material contained in the cometary dust could explain the existence of carbon among the measured pickup ions. Impact-produced ions may locally influence the plasma parameters of the solar wind. It will be possible to study in situ these dust-plasma interactions and the central region of meteoroid activity through measurements in the inner solar system proposed for the currently discussed Solar Probe and Solar Orbiter missions.