Physics
Scientific paper
May 2002
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2002agusmsm31a..03f&link_type=abstract
American Geophysical Union, Spring Meeting 2002, abstract #SM31A-03
Physics
2724 Magnetopause, Cusp, And Boundary Layers
Scientific paper
Extremely large diamagnetic cavities have been observed on many successive passes when the POLAR spacecraft was crossing through the dayside high-altitude cusp regions. These diamagnetic cavities were associated with an extended region of solar wind plasma inside the magnetopause coincident with a depressed and turbulent magnetic field. These observations argue that the cusp in a region of very broad extent, and not the funnel-shaped feature depicted in schematic drawings to date. The size of the cavities was found to be as large as 6 Re. There is an energetic component of ions associated nearly always with these cavities that have energies more typical of the trapped ring current and radiation belt populations than the solar wind. The intensities of the energetic ions were observed to increase by many orders of the magnitudes during the cavity crossings, indicating the dayside high-altitude cusp diamagnetic cavity is a key region for transferring the solar wind energy, mass, and momentum into the Earth's magnetosphere. Use of the variation of the charge state of solar wind Fe ions at the ACE spacecraft and at Polar has indicated that energization of ions to these high energies is a rapid process. The charge state distribution of these cusp cavity ions was indicative of their seed populations being a mixture of the ionospheric and the solar wind particles in many cases. Taken together these facts argue for a local acceleration of plasma within the cusp to 10s and 100s of keV. By their geometry cusp magnetic field lines are connected to all of the magnetopause boundary layers and these cavity charged particles will form an energetic particle layer on the magnetopause.
Chen Jiahua
Fritz Teresa A.
Zong Qiugang
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