Transport of O+ From the Cusp to the Plasma Sheet: Coordinated CLUSTER/Double Star TC-1 Observations

Details Transport of O+ From the Cusp to the Plasma Sheet: Coordinated CLUSTER/Double Star TC-1 Observations Transport of O+ From the Cusp to the Plasma Sheet: Coordinated CLUSTER/Double Star TC-1 Observations

Dec 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008agufmsm12a..04k&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2008, abstract #SM12A-04

Other

2736 Magnetosphere/Ionosphere Interactions (2431), 2744 Magnetotail, 2760 Plasma Convection (2463), 2764 Plasma Sheet, 2788 Magnetic Storms And Substorms (7954)

Scientific paper

Using CLUSTER CIS/CODIF data, O+ is clearly observed flowing from the cusp, over the polar cap, and into the plasma sheet at the CLUSTER apogee of 19 Re. This O+ transport to the plasma sheet is predominantly observed during storm times, and may be a dominant source for the storm time ring current. However, due to the polar orbit of CLUSTER, this data set cannot be used to measure the O+ transport to the plasma sheet closer to the earth. Thus we cannot tell if the O+ has direct access via the lobe to the near-earth plasma sheet, or whether it comes from the lobe to the mid-tail plasma sheet, and then is convected inward. The Double Star TC-1 satellite, with a near-equatorial orbit, with 13 Re apogee, is helping to fill this gap. While TC-1 does not have an ion composition instrument, the O+ is often identifiable by its distribution function. In the lobe it appears as a mono-energetic tailward streaming population. In the plasma mantle, it also has a narrow energy distribution, and flows at the same velocity, and therefore at higher energies, than the H+. We have identified a number of events in which tailward streaming O+ is observed both by Double Star and by the CLUSTER spacecraft. In two events, which occurred during storm times, Double Star observed O+ streaming around the dawn-side flank while Cluster observed it entering the plasma sheet at 18 Re. In other events, the tailward streaming O+ distributions just outside the plasma sheet are observed both at Double Star, at 13 Re, and at Cluster, at 18 Re. In other events, Cluster observes the O+ over the polar cap, while Double Star observes it in the lobe inside 13 Re. These observations clearly show that the O+ from the cusp is transported through the lobe to the near-earth (<13 Re ) plasma sheet.

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