Rayleigh-Taylor type Instability in auroral patches

Details Rayleigh-Taylor type Instability in auroral patches Rayleigh-Taylor type Instability in auroral patches

Dec 2008

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2008agufmsm21a1679s&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2008, abstract #SM21A-1679

Physics

0310 Airglow And Aurora, 2407 Auroral Ionosphere (2704), 2704 Auroral Phenomena (2407), 2730 Magnetosphere: Inner, 2764 Plasma Sheet

Scientific paper

Based on narrow-field-of-view camera observations of patchy auroral structures during substorm recovery phase, we found finger-like structures with a scale size of ~5-25 km at the western boundary of the auroral patches. The observations were made during the THEMIS satellites - ground auroral campaign at Gillam (56.4N, 265.4E), Canada, for January 2-16, 2008. We suggest that the finger-like structures are caused by macroscopic Rayleigh-Taylor type plasma instability arising in the magnetospheric equatorial plane due to force balance between (eastward) magnetic tension force and (westward) pressure gradient force. The instability can be the cause of structuring of diffuse aurora into patches.

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