Observations of Large-Scale Magnetospheric Currents during Geomagnetic Storms
Thursday, October 1, 2015: 9:40 AM
Guan Le1, James A Slavin2, Robert J Strangeway3, Robert F Pfaff Jr1, Hermann Luhr4, Brian J Anderson5, Christopher T Russell3, Kenneth R Bromund1, Hannes Karl Leinweber3, Werner Magnes6, Rumi Nakamura6, Ferdinand Plaschke6, David Fischer6, Larry Kepko1, Olivier Le Contel7, Roy B Torbert8, Henry T Freudenreich1, Steven C Martin1, Wolfgang Baumjohann6 and Claudia Stolle4, (1)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (2)University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, United States, (3)University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA, United States, (4)Helmholtz Centre Potsdam GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany, (5)Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, United States, (6)Space Research Institute, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Graz, Austria, (7)Laboratoire de Physique des Plasmas, Paris, France, (8)Univ New Hampshire, Durham, NH, United States
Abstract:
In this paper, we review our recent observations of large-scale magnetospheric current systems during geomagnetic storms using magnetic field measurements from multiple satellites. Magnetospheric currents respond dynamically to the solar wind-magnetosphere interaction. Both spatial and temporal resolutions of a space-based observing system play an important role in understanding these current systems and the magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling. Multi-point measurements from polar orbiting LEO constellation such as Space Technology 5 (ST-5) and Swarm allow us to understand spatial characteristics and temporal evolution of auroral field-aligned currents and their ionospheric closure. Measurements from low-inclination LEO satellite such as Communication/Navigation Outage Satellite (C/NOFS) can be used to monitor the stormtime ring current and specify its temporal evolution and local time asymmetry. During the main phase of the large storm on March 17, 2015, Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) constellation crossed the magnetopause current layer at unusual locations of pre-dawn equatorial region. We will compare the equatorial observations with correlative ionospheric observations of field-aligned currents from Swarm constellation and the Active Magnetosphere and Polar Electrodynamics Response Experiment (AMPERE) to understand the magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling during the storm.
