Studying Dawn‐Dusk Asymmetries of Mercury's Magnetotail Using MHD‐EPIC Simulations

Chen, Yuxi; Tóth, Gábor; Jia, Xianzhe; Slavin, James A.; Sun, Weijie; Markidis, Stefano; Gombosi, Tamas I.; Raines, Jim M.

doi:10.1029/2019JA026840

Title: Studying Dawn‐Dusk Asymmetries of Mercury's Magnetotail Using MHD‐EPIC Simulations

Journal Article · 23 November 2019 · Journal of Geophysical Research. Space Physics

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JA026840 · OSTI ID:1575315

^[1];

^[1]; Markidis, Stefano ^[2];

^[1];

^[1]

Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering University of Michigan Ann Arbor MI USA
KTH Stockholm Sweden

Abstract MESSENGER has observed a lot of dawn‐dusk asymmetries in Mercury's magnetotail, such as the asymmetries of the cross‐tail current sheet thickness and the occurrence of flux ropes, dipolarization events, and energetic electron injections. In order to obtain a global pictures of Mercury's magnetotail dynamics and the relationship between these asymmetries, we perform global simulations with the magnetohydrodynamics with embedded particle‐in‐cell (MHD‐EPIC) model, where Mercury's magnetotail region is covered by a PIC code. Our simulations show that the dawnside current sheet is thicker, the plasma density is larger, and the electron pressure is higher than the duskside. Under a strong interplanetary magnetic field driver, the simulated reconnection sites prefer the dawnside. We also found the dipolarization events and the planetward electron jets are moving dawnward while they are moving toward the planet, so that almost all dipolarization events and high‐speed plasma flows concentrate in the dawn sector. The simulation results are consistent with MESSENGER observations.

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Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE

Grant/Contract Number:: AC52-06NA25396

OSTI ID:: 1575315

Journal Information:: Journal of Geophysical Research. Space Physics, Journal Name: Journal of Geophysical Research. Space Physics Vol. 124 Journal Issue: 11; ISSN 2169-9380

Publisher:: American Geophysical Union (AGU)Copyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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Cited by: 22 works

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