A global simulation of the magnetosphere with a long tail: Southward and northward IMF

Details A global simulation of the magnetosphere with a long tail: Southward and northward IMF A global simulation of the magnetosphere with a long tail: Southward and northward IMF

Jun 1991

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=1991gsml.rept.....u&link_type=abstract

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Physics

Interplanetary Magnetic Fields, Magnetic Field Reconnection, Magnetohydrodynamics, Magnetopause, Plasmas (Physics), Simulation, Three Dimensional Models, Dynamic Pressure, Geomagnetism, Plasma Layers, Shapes, Solar Wind

Scientific paper

Through a global three dimensional magnetohydrodynamic simulation, the effect of the Interplanetary Magnetic Field (IMF), both northward and southward, on Earth's magnetosphere was investigated. A southward IMF, upon reconnecting at the dayside magnetopause of the Earth's magnetic field is swept back by solar wind flow and drapes the magnetotail. This gives rise to a plasma sheet cross-tail current increase and explosive magnetic reconnection at around 15 R sub E. This reconnection results in the formation of a large plasmoid which grows much faster than for the simulation with no IMF, thus supporting, in a convincing way with a minimum of assumptions, previous notions that a southward IMF is a driving mechanism of plasma sheet reconnection. A northward IMF is observed to reconnect with the magnetosphere along the cusp shoulder, stripping magnetic field lines away and weakening compression of the plasma sheet. In order to accommodate a balance of magnetic to dynamic pressure along the magnetopause, the magnetosphere changes from its usual comet-like shape to that resembling a tadpole as it attempts to return to a dipolar structure.

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