Dayside auroral bright spots and multi-spacecraft observations of fluctuations occurring along the dusk flank magnetopause
Presentation Type
Poster
Presenter Format
In Person Meeting Talk
Topic
System Science
Start Date
10-5-2022 5:30 PM
Abstract
Dayside auroral bright spots (aka vortices, or ‘beads’) have been observed at Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn in regions that map to the flank magnetopause boundary layer. It has been suggested that these bright spots are associated with the Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability. The confinement of current to the observed brights spots (vortices) occurs within a limited size range. It is likely that as KH vortices evolve through a range of spatial scales as they propagate along the magnetopause flank, the ionosphere bright spots (‘beads’) would be most visible where and when the KH spatial size is optimal (cf., Johnson et al., 2020).
During 2018 November 06, 11:30 – 18:00 UT, the MMS constellation, the Cluster set of spacecraft, and the Geotail spacecraft were all situated near the dusk flank magnetopause. Large scale fluctuations were observed by the available and operating science instruments at these various spacecraft. Similar fluctuations were not observed by upstream solar wind monitors, suggesting that the fluctuations were initiated at the magnetopause. A localized dayside auroral bright spot from the post-noon ionosphere was also observed from low Earth orbit. The nature and relation of the fluctuations observed near the dusk flank magnetopause and the connection to the post-noon high-latitude ionosphere are investigated.
Dayside auroral bright spots and multi-spacecraft observations of fluctuations occurring along the dusk flank magnetopause
Dayside auroral bright spots (aka vortices, or ‘beads’) have been observed at Earth, Jupiter, and Saturn in regions that map to the flank magnetopause boundary layer. It has been suggested that these bright spots are associated with the Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instability. The confinement of current to the observed brights spots (vortices) occurs within a limited size range. It is likely that as KH vortices evolve through a range of spatial scales as they propagate along the magnetopause flank, the ionosphere bright spots (‘beads’) would be most visible where and when the KH spatial size is optimal (cf., Johnson et al., 2020).
During 2018 November 06, 11:30 – 18:00 UT, the MMS constellation, the Cluster set of spacecraft, and the Geotail spacecraft were all situated near the dusk flank magnetopause. Large scale fluctuations were observed by the available and operating science instruments at these various spacecraft. Similar fluctuations were not observed by upstream solar wind monitors, suggesting that the fluctuations were initiated at the magnetopause. A localized dayside auroral bright spot from the post-noon ionosphere was also observed from low Earth orbit. The nature and relation of the fluctuations observed near the dusk flank magnetopause and the connection to the post-noon high-latitude ionosphere are investigated.
