Identification

Title

Observations of a high-latitude stable electron auroral emission at ~16 MLT during a large substorm

Abstract

During an interval when the interplanetary magnetic field was large and primarily duskward and southward, a stable region of auroral emission was observed on 17 August 2001 by IMAGE at ∼16 magnetic local time, poleward of the main aurora, for 1 h, from before the onset of a large substorm through the recovery phase. In a region where ions showed the energy dispersion expected for the cusp, strong field-aligned currents and Poynting flux were observed by Polar (at 1.8 RE in the Southern Hemisphere) as it transited field lines mapping to the auroral spot in the Northern Hemisphere. The data are consistent with the hypothesis that the long-lasting electron auroral spot maps to the magnetopause region where reconnection was occurring. Under the assumption of conjugacy between the Northern and Southern hemispheres on these field lines, the Polar data suggest that the electrons on these field lines were accelerated by Alfven waves and/or a quasi-static electric field, primarily at altitudes below a few RE since the in situ Poynting flux (mapped to 100 km) is comparable to the energy flux of the emission while the mapped in situ electron energy flux is much smaller. This event provides the first example of an emission due to electrons accelerated at low altitudes at the foot point of a region of quasi-steady dayside reconnection. Cluster data in the magnetotail indicate that the Poynting flux from the reconnection region during this substorm is large enough to account for the observed nightside aurora.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.org/ark:/85065/d7125t6n

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

North bounding latitude

South bounding latitude

Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2011-07-19T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

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Conformity

Data format

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version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact