Scientific Discoveries Enabled by the Swarm Electric Field Instruments: The First Five Years

The Swarm Electric Field Instruments (EFIs) include two Thermal Ion Imagers (TIIs) measuring ion flow velocity and temperature in the horizontal and vertical planes, and two Langmuir Probes (LPs) measuring plasma density, electron temperature, and spacecraft potential. This presentation highlights discoveries made possible by the EFIs and published in more than two dozen scientific papers, including studies of polar cap density patches, intense high-latitude flow channels, field-aligned Poynting flux at high and low latitudes, electrodynamics of auroral and sub-auroral arcs, Alfvenic coupling of the magnetosphere and ionosphere, and ionospheric structure and anomalies. Recent, unpublished results will be featured as well.