We investigate a fifteen-day period in October 2011. Auroral observations by the SSUSI instrument onboard the DMSP F16, F17, and F18 spacecraft indicate that the polar regions were covered by weak cusp-aligned arc emissions whenever the IMF clock angle was small, |θ|<45°, which amounted to 30% of the time. Simultaneous observations of ions and electrons in the tail by the Cluster C4 and Geotail spacecraft showed that during these intervals dense (1 cm-3) plasma was observed, even as far from the equatorial plane of the tail as |ZGSE| = 13 RE. The ions had a pitch angle distribution peaking parallel and antiparallel to the magnetic field and the electrons had pitch angles that peaked perpendicular to the field. We interpret the counter-streaming ions and double loss-cone electrons as evidence that the plasma was trapped on closed field lines, and acted as a source for the cusp-aligned arc emission across the polar regions. This suggests that the magnetosphere was almost entirely closed during these periods. We further argue that the closure occured as a consequence of dual-lobe reconnection at the dayside magnetopause. Our finding forces a significant re-evaluation of the magnetic topology of the magnetosphere during periods of northwards IMF.

We present a study of the magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling during the 23 March 2023 magnetic storm, focusing on the effect of the drastic decrease of the solar wind dynamic pressure occurred during the main phase. Our observations show that the negative pressure pulse had significant impact to the magnetosphere-ionosphere system. It weakened large-scale field-aligned currents and paused the progression of the storm main phase for ~3 hrs. Due to the sudden decrease of the plasma convection after the negative pressure pulse, the low-latitude ionosphere was over-shielded and experienced a brief period of westward penetration electric field, which reversed the direction of the equatorial electrojet. The counter electrojet was observed both in space and on the ground. A transient, localized enhancement of downward field-aligned current was observed near dawn, consistent with the mechanism for transmitting MHD disturbances from magnetosphere to the ionosphere after the negative pressure pulse.

Magnetic reconnection occurring between the interplanetary magnetic field and the dayside magnetopause causes a circulation of magnetic flux and plasma within the magnetosphere, known as the Dungey cycle. This circulation is transmitted to the ionosphere via field-aligned currents (FACs). The magnetic flux transport within the Dungey cycle is quantified by the cross-polar cap potential (CPCP or transpolar voltage). Previous studies have suggested that under strong driving conditions the CPCP can saturate near a value of 250 kV. In this study we investigate whether an analogous saturation occurs in the magnitudes of the FACs, using observations from the Active Magnetosphere and Planetary Electrodynamics Response Experiment (AMPERE). The solar wind speed, density and pressure, the Bz component of the interplanetary magnetic field, and combinations of these, were compared to the concurrent integrated current magnitude, across each hemisphere. We find that FAC magnitudes are controlled most strongly by solar wind speed and the orientation and strength of the interplanetary magnetic field. FAC magnitude increases monotonically with solar wind driving but there is a distinct knee in the variation around IMF Bz = -10 nT, above which the increase slows.

High-Intensity Long-Duration Continuous AE Activity (HILDCAA) intervals are driven by High Speed solar wind Streams (HSSs) during which the rapidly-varying interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) produces high but intermittent dayside reconnection rates. This results in several days of large, quasi-periodic enhancements in the auroral electrojet (AE) index. There has been debate over whether the enhancements in AE are produced by substorms or whether HILDCAAs represent a distinct class of magnetospheric dynamics. We investigate sixteen HILDCAA events using the expanding/contracting polar cap model as a framework to understand the magnetospheric dynamics occurring during HSSs. Each HILDCAA onset shows variations in open magnetic flux, dayside and nightside reconnection rates, the cross-polar cap potential, and AL that are characteristic of substorms. The enhancements in AE are produced by activity in the pre-midnight sector, which is the typical substorm onset region. The periodicities present in the intermittent IMF determine the exact nature of the activity, producing a range of behaviours from a sequence of isolated substorms, through substorms which merge into one-another, to almost continuous geomagnetic activity. The magnitude of magnetic fluctuations, $dB/dt$, in the pre-midnight sector during HSSs is sufficient to produce a significant risk of Geomagnetically Induced Currents, which can be detrimental to power-grids and pipelines.

We present three events where high-resolution electric and magnetic field measurements from the Swarm satellite constellation coincided with excellent F-region ionospheric coverage from SuperDARN. Large-scale ionospheric convection patterns from SuperDARN, together with field-aligned-current patterns from AMPERE, provide information on quasi-static ionospheric dynamics traversed by Swarm. Because the Swarm observations and orbital path coincided with favorable SuperDARN/AMPERE observing conditions, it was possible to filter the Swarm electric field observations into a quasi-static component that agreed with the SuperDARN electric field. We contend that the residual electric field from Swarm is thus indicative of small- and mesoscale dynamics not captured by the convection and FAC patterns. We compare calculations of the Poynting flux between the different instruments and show that dynamics on small- to mesoscales can be highly variable within structures like field-aligned currents. In the events shown, small- and medium-scale Poynting fluxes occasionally dominate over that from large-scale processes.

NASA designated Reiner Gamma (RG) as the landing site for the first Payloads and Research Investigations on the Surface of the Moon (PRISM) delivery (dubbed PRISM-1a). Reiner Gamma is home to a magnetic anomaly, a region of magnetized crustal rocks. The RG magnetic anomaly is co-located with the type example of a class of irregular high-reflectance markings known as lunar swirls. RG is an ideal location to study how local magnetic fields change the interaction of an airless body with the solar wind, producing stand-off regions that are described as mini-magnetospheres. The Lunar Vertex mission, selected by NASA for PRISM-1a, has the following major goals: 1) Investigate the origin of lunar magnetic anomalies; 2) Determine the structure of the mini-magnetosphere that forms over the RG magnetic anomaly; 3) Investigate the origin of lunar swirls; and 4) Evaluate the importance of micrometeoroid bombardment vs. ion/electron exposure in the space weathering of silicate regolith. The mission goals will be accomplished by the following payload elements. The lander suite includes: The Vertex Camera Array (VCA), a set of fixed-mounted cameras. VCA images will be used to (a) survey landing site geology, and (b) perform photometric modeling to yield information on regolith characteristics. The Vector Magnetometer-Lander (VML) is a fluxgate magnetometer. VML will operate during descent and once on the surface to measure the in-situ magnetic field. Sophisticated gradiometry allows for separation of the natural field from that of the lander. The Magnetic Anomaly Plasma Spectrometer (MAPS) is a plasma analyzer that measures the energy, flux, and direction of ions and electrons. The lander will deploy a rover that conducts a traverse reaching ≥500 m distance, obtaining spatially distributed measurements at locations outside the zone disturbed by the lander rocket exhaust. The rover will carry two instruments: The Vector Magnetometer-Rover (VMR) is an array of miniature COTS magnetometers to measure the surface field. The Rover Multispectral Microscope (RMM) will collect images in the wavelength range ~0.34–1.0 um. RMM will reveal the composition, texture, and particle-size distribution of the regolith.

We report observations of the ion dynamics inside an Alfven branch wave that propagates near the reconnecting dayside magnetopause. The measured frequency, wave normal angle and polarization are within 1% with the predictions of a dispersion solver, and indicate that the wave is an electromagnetic ion cyclotron wave with very oblique wave vector. The magnetospheric plasma contains hot protons (keV), cold protons (eV), plus some heavy ions. The cold protons follow the magnetic field fluctuations and remain frozen-in, while the hot protons are at the limit of magnetization. The cold proton velocity fluctuations contribute to balance the Hall term in Ohm’s law, allowing the wave polarization to be highly-elliptical and right-handed, a necessary condition for propagation at oblique wave normal angles. The dispersion solver indicates that increasing the cold proton density facilitates generation and propagation of these waves at oblique angles, as it occurs for the observed wave.

Characterization of Earth’s magnetic field is key to understanding the dynamics of core flows and the dynamo. Satellite measurements of the magnetic field normally use precise magnetometers on a few spacecraft to acquire data over the entire globe over periods of months to years. The advent of commercial satellite constellations of tens to hundreds of satellites may offer complementary observations, even with low-precision magnetometers, providing rapid global coverage. Here we assess whether the magnetic field data from the Iridium Communications constellation of 66 low Earth orbiting satellites can be used to determine the geometry of Earth’s main field. The Iridium satellites are in near polar, 86° inclination, 780 km altitude, circular orbits, with 11 satellites in each of six orbit planes evenly spaced in longitude. We use data from the first-generation Iridium satellites, launched in the late 1990s, and acquired for scientific analysis beginning in January 2010. Although digitized with 30 nT resolution, the uncertainties in the data are random errors so that the statistics of 300,000 samples/day allow determination of the average magnetic field in 9° latitude by 9° longitude bins to about 3 nT. The data reduction, inter-calibration, quiet interval selection, and uncertainty assessment are described. Time series of spherical harmonic coefficients are used to identify artifacts and derive maps of corrected residuals at the average Iridium orbit altitude. From 2010 to 2015 the evolution of the field agrees on average between Iridium and the CHAOS 7.4 model to within 30 nT standard deviation, or ~5 nT/yr.

A new technique has been developed in which the high-latitude electric potential is determined from field-aligned current observations from the Active Magnetosphere and Planetary Electrodynamics Response Experiment (AMPERE) and conductances modeled by Sami3 is Also a Model of the Ionosphere (SAMI3). This is a development of the Magnetosphere-Ionosphere Coupling (MIX) approach first demonstrated by Merkin and Lyon (2010). An advantage of using SAMI3 is that the model can be used to predict Total Electron Content (TEC) in the polar caps, based on the AMPERE-derived potential solutions. 23 May 2014 is chosen as a case study to assess the new technique for a moderately disturbed case (min Dst: -36 nT, max AE: 909 nT) with good GPS data coverage. The new AMPERE/SAMI3 solutions are compared against independent GPS-based TEC observations from the Multi-Instrument Data Analysis Software (MIDAS) by Mitchell and Spencer, 2003, and against Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) ion drift data. The comparison shows excellent agreement between the location of the tongue of ionization in the MIDAS GPS data and the AMPERE/SAMI3 potential pattern, and good overall agreement with DMSP drifts. SAMI3 predictions of high-latitude TEC are much improved when using the AMPERE-derived potential as compared to that of the Weimer (2005) model. The two potential models have substantial differences, with Weimer producing an average 77 kV cross-cap potential versus 60 kV for the AMPERE-derived potential. The results indicate that the 66-satellite Iridium constellation provides sufficient resolution of field-aligned currents to estimate large-scale ionospheric convection as it impacts TEC.

The Earth’s magnetosphere is filled by particles from two sources: the solar wind and the ionosphere. Ionospheric ions are initially cold and contain He+ and O+, in addition to to H+. Depending on their initial magnetic latitude and local time, and the state of the magnetosphere, they may contribute to the plasmasphere, the plasma sheet, the ring current, the warm plasma cloak etc. Depending on which path they follow in the magnetosphere, some of these ionospheric ions remain cold when they reach the two key reconnection regions: the Earth’s magnetopause and the plasma sheet in the tail. In this presentation, we will first review previous statistical works that quantify the number of cold/ionospheric ions near these two regions. Several works have attempted to quantify these populations, but they are inherently difficult to characterize due to their low energy, often below the spacecraft potential. We will also discuss the impacts they have on the magnetic reconnection process. Ionospheric ions mass-load the regions where reconnection takes place and change the characteristic Alfven speed, resulting in a smaller reconnection electric field. They also take a portion of the energy that is imparted to particles, affecting the energy budget of magnetic reconnection. Finally, they introduce new length and time scales, associated to their gyroradius and gyroperiod. We will discuss what are the implications of these impacts for the evolution of the magnetosphere – solar wind interactions.

Ionospheric ions (mainly H+, He+ and O+) escape from the ionosphere and populate the Earth’s magnetosphere. Their thermal energies are usually low when they first escape the ionosphere, typically a few eV to tens of eV, but are energized in their journey through the magnetosphere. The ionospheric population is variable, and it makes significant contributions to the magnetospheric mass density in key regions where magnetic reconnection is at work. Solar wind - magnetosphere coupling occurs primarily via magnetic reconnection, a key plasma process that enables transfer of mass and energy into the near-Earth space environment. Reconnection leads to the triggering of magnetospheric storms, aurorae, energetic particle precipitation and a host of other magnetospheric phenomena. Several works in the last decades have attempted to statistically quantify the amount of ionospheric plasma supplied to the magnetosphere, including the two key regions where magnetic reconnection proceeds: the dayside magnetopause and the magnetotail. Recent in-situ observations by the Magnetospheric Multiscale spacecraft and associated modelling have advanced our current understanding of how ionospheric ions alter the magnetic reconnection process at meso- and small-scales, including its onset and efficiency. This article compiles the current understanding of the ionospheric plasma supply to the magnetosphere. It reviews both the quantification of these sources and their effects on the process of magnetic reconnection. It also provides a global description of how the ionospheric ion contribution modifies the way the solar wind couples to the Earth’s magnetosphere and how these ions modify the global dynamics of the near-Earth space environment.