P21A-2073
Implications of MAVEN Mars Near-Wake Measurements and Models
Tuesday, 15 December 2015
Poster Hall (Moscone South)
Janet G Luhmann1, Chuanfei Dong2, Yingjuan Ma3, Shannon Curry4, David L Mitchell1, Christian Xavier Mazelle5, Jared R Espley6, John E P Connerney6, Jasper S Halekas7, David Brain1 and Bruce Martin Jakosky8, (1)University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, 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)Space Sciences Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, United States, (5)University Paul Sabatier Toulouse III, Toulouse Cedex 09, France, (6)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (7)University of Iowa, Physics and Astronomy, Iowa City, IA, United States, (8)Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, Boulder, CO, United States
Abstract:
Mars is typically viewed as a member of the category of weakly magnetized planets, with a largely induced magnetosphere and magnetotail produced by the draped fields of the solar wind interaction. However, MHD models of the interaction suggest much of its wake magnetic flux is instead rooted in Mars. MAVEN suprathermal electron and magnetic field observations in the near wake, sampled along its elliptical orbit during the early prime mission at altitudes ranging from its ~150 km periapsis to the tail magnetosheath, are found consistent with the idea that the magnetic fields are connected to the planet throughout much of the Martian magnetotail. A combination of these in-situ data and MHD models is used to illustrate this finding.
