Low-Latitude Boundary Layer Formation Through Variable Northward and Southward IMF Reconnection

Details Low-Latitude Boundary Layer Formation Through Variable Northward and Southward IMF Reconnection Low-Latitude Boundary Layer Formation Through Variable Northward and Southward IMF Reconnection

Dec 2001

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2001agufmsm41b0810o&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2001, abstract #SM41B-0810

Physics

2724 Magnetopause, Cusp, And Boundary Layers, 2731 Magnetosphere: Outer, 7835 Magnetic Reconnection

Scientific paper

The low-latitude boundary layer (LLBL) is formed by reconnection, and it continuously evolves as reconnection changes in response to the changing interplanetary magnetic field (IMF). In the case of southward IMF reconnection, the LLBL forms directly at low latitudes where reconnection is occurring. For northward IMF, the LLBL forms through the draping of field lines over the dayside magnetopause that reconnected at high latitudes in either the Northern or Southern Hemisphere or in both hemispheres. New closed boundary layer field lines are added to the magnetosphere when high-latitude reconnection occurs in both hemispheres under northward IMF conditions, while low-latitude reconnection during southward IMF removes magnetic flux from the dayside magnetosphere, thereby decreasing the boundary layer thickness. Observations are presented from the Hydra plasma instrument on the Polar spacecraft that show the presence of boundary layer plasma near the open/closed field-line boundary just equatorward of the cusp. During these crossings, the cusp exhibits the typical energy-latitude dispersion indicating that low-latitude, southward-IMF reconnection is currently taking place. From the plasma properties in the boundary layer, we conclude that the boundary layer had formed during a prior period of northward IMF reconnection, and that the cusp crossing by Polar took place before this boundary layer had fully eroded following the southward turning of the IMF. These results suggest that the boundary layer which is commonly observed just equatorward of the cusp can exist on closed field lines, and that this closed boundary layer forms through high-latitude reconnection during periods of northward IMF, rather than through some diffusion process.

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