Hiss induced radiation belt electron loss timescales in the plasmasphere based on ray tracings of wave propagation angle

Abstract:

Plasmaspheric hiss plays an important role in driving resonant scattering losses of radiation belt electrons and thereby largely controls the lifetimes of electrons in the plasmasphere. Besides the spectral information of waves, an accurate investigation of hiss induced radiation belt electron loss timescales requires the details of wave normal angle distribution during propagation along the field line, which however is difficult to obtain directly from in situ measurements but can be reasonably evaluated from ray tracing of hiss propagation on basis of reasonable setups of background field and plasma density. By assuming a nominal and suitable plasmapause location at L = 4.5, we report the ray tracing results of hiss wave propagation angles for various hiss wave frequencies at various L-shells in the plasmasphere. Subsequently, we construct the improved model of hiss wave normal angle distribution with dependence on both wave frequency, magnetic latitude and L-shell, which is used to compute the quasi-linear bounce-averaged rates of electron scattering due to plasmaspheric hiss and perform the pure pitch angle diffusion simulations. Hiss induced radiation belt electron loss timescales are then determined from the simulated temporal evolution of electron fluxes after reaching the equilibrium state, as a function of electron kinetic energy and L-shell, which is of importance for incorporation into future simulations of the radiation belt electron dynamics under various geomagnetic conditions to comprehend the exact contribution of plasmaspheric hiss.