Ion Temperatures and Densities in Jupiter's Middle Magnetosphere and Consequences for Coupling to the Auroral Ionosphere

Details Ion Temperatures and Densities in Jupiter's Middle Magnetosphere and Consequences for Coupling to the Auroral Ionosphere Ion Temperatures and Densities in Jupiter's Middle Magnetosphere and Consequences for Coupling to the Auroral Ionosphere

Dec 2006

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006agufmsm23a0296p&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2006, abstract #SM23A-0296

Physics

2704 Auroral Phenomena (2407), 2736 Magnetosphere/Ionosphere Interactions (2431), 2756 Planetary Magnetospheres (5443, 5737, 6033), 5706 Aurorae, 6270 Pluto And Satellites

Scientific paper

A survey of Jupiter's middle and inner magnetosphere during the Galileo mission finds that the location for the breakdown of corotation coincides with an increase in ion temperatures, and also with the occurrence of electron beams observed in the equatorial magnetosphere with energies several keV to several tens of keV. The electron beams have been a mystery, because they appear to have origins at low altitude, but would require substantial energies to escape the ~ 100 kV potential well that is thought to exist in the auroral region to accelerate electrons into the ionosphere and provide continuity of the coupling currents. That potential is needed if the thermal magnetospheric electrons are electrostatically bound in the equatorial plane with the thermal ions trapped there by the centrifugal potential. However, the observed thermal energy of ions in this region approaches values required to overcome the centrifugal potential, and thus the ions are not entirely confined to the equatorial plane. Under these conditions, the thermal electrons may feed the current system without the development of large potentials. Electrons heated at low altitude would not be trapped in such a forbidding potential well, but could escape to the magnetosphere. This scenario would provide partial explanation for the beams, though a mechanism for heating the electrons remains unknown.

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