Theoretical Predictions of Inner-Magnetospheric Disturbances Associated with Geosynchronous Particle Flux Decreases

Details Theoretical Predictions of Inner-Magnetospheric Disturbances Associated with Geosynchronous Particle Flux Decreases Theoretical Predictions of Inner-Magnetospheric Disturbances Associated with Geosynchronous Particle Flux Decreases

May 2001

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2001agusm..sm32c06s&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2001, abstract #SM32C-06

Physics

2730 Magnetosphere--Inner, 2740 Magnetospheric Configuration And Dynamics, 2753 Numerical Modeling, 2760 Plasma Convection

Scientific paper

Observations of low-energy (below 50 keV) particle fluxes by Los Alamos geosynchronous satellites raise the possibility that the inner plasma sheet particle pressure sometimes decreases significantly in the early recovery phase of a magnetic storm. Numerical simulations of the inner magnetospheric dynamics have been carried out with the Rice Convection Model (RCM) to explore the consequences of such plasma sheet pressure reduction. For these runs, the RCM's outer boundary is placed at geosynchronous orbit. In the ideal one-fluid MHD picture, entrance of low-pressure plasma into the nightside inner magnetosphere following a ring current injection is interchange-unstable. The numerical RCM multi-fluid simulations, which take transport by gradient-curvature drift into account, suggest that the real system, while more stable than in ideal MHD, can nevertheless display interchange instability. If the plasma sheet pressure at the RCM boundary is assumed to drop dramatically while convection remains strong, the results indicate a strong interchange instability, with highly structured inner plasma sheet density, wave-like large-scale modulations of the equatorward edge of the diffuse aurora, and swirl-like patterns of the potential in the low-latitude part of the auroral zone. Such a global disturbance should be observable with global imaging measurement techniques and ground-based instruments. Results will be presented from additional computer experiments designed to determine the sensitivity of the instability to the assumed geosynchronous pressure reduction and convection rate.

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