Ionospheric and magnetospheric plasmapauses'

Technical Report · Sat Oct 01 00:00:00 EDT 1977

OSTI ID:6930636

Grebowsky, J M; Hoffman, J H; Maynard, N C

During August 1972, Explorer 45, orbiting near the equatorial plane with an apogee of about 5.2 R/sub e/, traversed magnetic field lines in close proximity to those simultaneously traversed by the topside ionospheric satellite ISIS 2 near dusk in the L range 2-5.4. The locations of the Explorer 45 plasmapause crossings during this month were compared to the latitudinal decreases of the H/sup +/ density observed on ISIS 2 near the same magnetic field lines. The equatorially determined plasmapause field lines typically passed through or poleward of the minimum of the ionospheric light-ion trough, with coincident satellite passes occurring for which the L separation between the plasmapause and trough field lines was between 1 and 2. Vertical flows of the H/sup +/ ions in the light ion trough as detected by the magnetic ion mass spectrometer on ISIS were directed upward with velocities between 1 and 2 kilometers/sec near dusk on these passes. These velocities decreased to lower values on the low latitude side of the H/sup +/ trough but did not show any noticeable change across the field lines corresponding to the magnetospheric plasmapause.

• Research Organization: National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Greenbelt, Md. (USA). Goddard Space Flight Center
• OSTI ID: 6930636
• Report Number(s): N-78-10646; NASA-TM-X-71416; X-621-77-257
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

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71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS
GENERAL PHYSICS
CATIONS
CHARGED PARTICLES
DISTRIBUTION
EARTH ATMOSPHERE
HYDROGEN IONS
HYDROGEN IONS 1 PLUS
ION DENSITY
IONOSPHERE
IONS
MAGNETIC FIELDS
MAGNETOSPHERE
PLASMAPAUSE
SPATIAL DISTRIBUTION
VELOCITY