Structure and dynamics of Saturn's outer magnetosphere and boundary regions

Technical Report · Sun May 01 04:00:00 EDT 1983

OSTI ID:6674162

Behannon, K W; Lepping, R P; Ness, N F

In 1979-1981, the three USA spacecraft Pioneer 11 and Voyagers 1 and 2 discovered and explored the magnetosphere of Saturn to the limited extent possible on flyby trajectories. Considerable variation in the locations of the bow shock (BS) and magnetopause (MP) surfaces were observed in association with variable solar wind conditions and, during the Voyager 2 encounter, possible immersion in Jupiter's distant magnetic tail. The limited number of BS and MP crossings were concentrated near the subsolar region and the dawn terminator, and that fact, together with the temporal variability, makes it difficult to assess the three dimensional shape of the sunward magnetospheric boundary. The combined BS and MP crossing positions from the three spacecraft yield an average BS-to-MP stagnation point distance ratio of 1.29 +/- 0.10. This is near the 1.33 value for the Earth's magnetosphere, implying a similar sunward shape at Saturn. Study of the structure and dynamical behavior of the outer magnetosphere, both in the sunward hemisphere and the magnetotail region using combined plasma and magnetic field data, suggest that Saturn's magnetosphere is more similar to that of Earth than that of Jupiter.

• Research Organization: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Greenbelt, MD (USA). Goddard Space Flight Center
• OSTI ID: 6674162
• Report Number(s): N-8330346; NASA-TM-85065
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

640107* -- Astrophysics & Cosmology-- Planetary Phenomena
71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
ATMOSPHERES
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MAGNETOPAUSE
PLANETARY ATMOSPHERES
PLANETARY MAGNETOSPHERES
PLANETS
SATURN PLANET