Multi-instrument observations of polar cap patches and  traveling ionospheric disturbances generated by solar wind  Alfvén waves coupling to the dayside magnetosphere

Prikryl, Paul; Gillies, Robert G.; Themens, David R.; Weygand, James M.; Thomas, Evan G.; Chakraborty, Shibaji

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/angeo-40-619-2022

Articles | Volume 40, issue 6

https://doi.org/10.5194/angeo-40-619-2022

© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/angeo-40-619-2022

© Author(s) 2022. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 40, issue 6

Regular paper

|

02 Nov 2022

Regular paper |

| 02 Nov 2022

Multi-instrument observations of polar cap patches and traveling ionospheric disturbances generated by solar wind Alfvén waves coupling to the dayside magnetosphere

Paul Prikryl, Robert G. Gillies, David R. Themens, James M. Weygand, Evan G. Thomas, and Shibaji Chakraborty

Data sets

Equivalent Ionospheric Currents (EICs) derived using the Spherical Elementary Currents Systems (SECS) technique at 10 sec Resolution in Geographic Coordinates J. M. Weygand https://doi.org/10.21978/P8D62B

Spherical Elementary Current (SEC) Amplitudes derived using the Spherical Elementary Currents Systems (SECS) technique at 10 sec Resolution in Geographic Coordinates J. M. Weygand https://doi.org/10.21978/P8PP8X

The SuperMAG data processing technique (https://supermag.jhuapl.edu/mag/) J. W. Gjerloev https://doi.org/10.1029/2012JA017683

Data from the CEDAR Madrigal database A. Coster https://w3id.org/cedar?experiment_list=experiments2/2016/gps/06mar16&file_list=los_20160306.001.h5

Data from the CEDAR Madrigal database A. Coster https://w3id.org/cedar?experiment_list=experiments2/2016/gps/14mar16&file_list=los_20160314.001.h5

Data from the CEDAR Madrigal database A. Coster https://w3id.org/cedar?experiment_list=experiments2/2016/gps/15mar16&file_list=los_20160315.001.h5

Data from the CEDAR Madrigal database A. Coster https://w3id.org/cedar?experiment_list=experiments4/2018/gps/05aug18&file_list=los_20180805.001.h5

Short summary

The solar wind interaction with Earth’s magnetic field deposits energy into the upper portion of the atmosphere at high latitudes. The coupling process that modulates the ionospheric convection and intensity of ionospheric currents leads to formation of densely ionized patches convecting across the polar cap. The ionospheric currents launch traveling ionospheric disturbances (TIDs) propagating equatorward. The polar cap patches and TIDs are then observed by networks of radars and GPS receivers.