  The solar wind is a magnetized plasma and as such exhibits collective plasma
behavior associated with its characteristic spatial and temporal scales. The
characteristic length scales include the size of the heliosphere, the
collisional mean free paths of all species, their inertial lengths, their
gyration radii, and their Debye lengths. The characteristic timescales include
the expansion time, the collision times, and the periods associated with
gyration, waves, and oscillations. We review the past and present research into
the multi-scale nature of the solar wind based on in-situ spacecraft
measurements and plasma theory. We emphasize that couplings of processes across
scales are important for the global dynamics and thermodynamics of the solar
wind. We describe methods to measure in-situ properties of particles and
fields. We then discuss the role of expansion effects, non-equilibrium
distribution functions, collisions, waves, turbulence, and kinetic
microinstabilities for the multi-scale plasma evolution.
