Characteristics of Terrestrial-Source Ion Distributions In and Around the Plasma Sheet Boundary Layer
Abstract
The Geotail, Cluster, and THEMIS missions provided many observations of the flow of terrestrial-source ions outward through the magnetic lobes and their subsequent interaction with the distant plasma sheet. A portion of that outflow gains significant energy through nonadiabatic acceleration upon encountering the plasma sheet boundary layer. Observations of cold ions within the plasma sheet may imply that a portion of that outflow may be exempted from the heating and acceleration processes in the plasma sheet boundary layer. Alternately, it is possible that the flow is able to quickly and directly flow outward from the ionosphere in recently connected plasma sheet flux tubes. With its 150ms-resolution ion distribution observations, the Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) Fast Plasma Investigation (FPI) offers the opportunity to trace the kinetic-scale evolution of these cold plasma distributions as they flow through the lobes and transition in energy to become part of the plasma sheet. This presentation summarizes the characteristics of these populations as observed during the first MMS magnetotail observation period, examines the ability of the FPI plasma spectrometers to resolve the processes at work, and will contrast the properties of the heating and acceleration mechanisms detected with those observed previously.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2017
- Bibcode:
- 2017AGUFMSA43B2657G
- Keywords:
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- 2427 Ionosphere/atmosphere interactions;
- IONOSPHERE;
- 2431 Ionosphere/magnetosphere interactions;
- IONOSPHERE;
- 2455 Particle precipitation;
- IONOSPHERE;
- 7807 Charged particle motion and acceleration;
- SPACE PLASMA PHYSICS