Particle Modeling of the Io Inner Torus Boundary

Details Particle Modeling of the Io Inner Torus Boundary Particle Modeling of the Io Inner Torus Boundary

May 2004

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2004agusmsa22a..04c&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2004, abstract #SA22A-04

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2732 Magnetosphere Interactions With Satellites And Rings

Scientific paper

The Galileo spacecraft passed through the Io torus and its inner boundary on December 7, 1995 and November 5, 2002, during the J0 and A34 passes. Measured plasma densities on both passes indicated a steep gradient at the Io torus inner boundary located between 4.5 and 5 jovian radii (Io is at 5.9 Rj), as well as a much less steep gradient in the outer torus, with a boundary at distances greater than 8 Rj. A simple particle model for Iogenic ion pickup and torus formation developed by Wang et al. (2001) produced an ion distribution which spans distances as far as ~0.5 Rj (20 Io radii) away from Io, as was observed by Galileo. Unlike observations, however, the modeled torus inner boundary is not steep and is much closer to Jupiter. It is possible that an outward transport of ions in the inner torus via flux tubes or some other mechanism will steepen the inner torus boundary. We alter the pickup conditions of the Wang et al. model and couple it to a simple radial convection model in an attempt to reproduce the observed inner boundary density gradient and location. In the Wang et al. model, which assumed a background plasma flow velocity at Io equal to the corotation velocity (74 km/s), the ion pickup velocity is 57 km/s. Decreasing the speed of the plasma flow, such that the ion pickup velocity is 20 km/s, is sufficient to move the inner boundary from ~3.4 Rj to ~4.7Rj.

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