Solar wind influence on Jupiter's aurora
Abstract
Jupiter's main auroral emission is driven by a system of corotation enforcement currents that arises to speed up outflowing Iogenic plasma and is not due to the magnetosphere-solar wind interaction like at Earth. The solar wind is generally expected to have only a small influence on Jupiter's magnetosphere and aurora compared to the influence of rotational stresses due to the planet's rapid rotation. However, there is considerable observational evidence that the solar wind does affect the magnetopause standoff distance, auroral radio emissions, and the position and brightness of the UV auroral emissions. Using the Michigan Solar Wind Model (mSWiM) to predict the solar wind conditions upstream of Jupiter we have identified intervals of high and low solar wind dynamic pressure in the Galileo dataset, and use this information to quantify how a magnetospheric compression affects the magnetospheric field configuration. We have developed separate spatial fits to the compressed and nominal magnetic field data, accounting for variations with radial distance and local time. These two fits can be used to update the flux equivalence mapping model of Vogt et al. (2011), which links auroral features to source regions in the middle and outer magnetosphere. The updated version accounts for changing solar wind conditions and provides a way to quantify the expected solar wind-induced variability in the ionospheric mapping of the main auroral emission, satellite footprints, and other auroral features. Our results are highly relevant to interpretation of the new auroral observations from the Juno mission.
- Publication:
-
AAS/Division for Planetary Sciences Meeting Abstracts #48
- Pub Date:
- October 2016
- Bibcode:
- 2016DPS....4842203G