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| Titel |
Simultaneous observations of flux transfer events by Cluster, THEMIS, Double Star and SuperDARN |
| VerfasserIn |
R. C. Fear, S. E. Milan, A. N. Fazakerley, C. M. Carr, I. Dandouras, K.-H. Fornacon |
| Konferenz |
EGU General Assembly 2009
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| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
Englisch
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| Digitales Dokument |
PDF |
| Erschienen |
In: GRA - Volume 11 (2009) |
| Datensatznummer |
250023382
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| Zusammenfassung |
| We present simultaneous observations of flux transfer events (FTEs) made by the THEMIS
and Cluster spacecraft on the 3rd May 2007, along with supporting observations of fast
ionospheric flows made by the SuperDARN radar network. The THEMIS spacecraft were in
a string-of-pearls formation approximately 20,000Â km long, and crossed the post-noon
magnetopause at low latitudes between 12:00Â UT (TH-C) and 14:30Â UT (TH-E). The
Cluster spacecraft were in a triangular formation tangential to the magnetopause with a
maximum separation of ~9,000Â km, and were situated in the magnetosheath at high latitudes
in the southern hemisphere, approaching the magnetopause which was crossed
at about 16:00Â UT. THEMIS observed ‘standard’ polarity FTEs between 11:00
and 15:00Â UT, whilst Cluster observed ‘reverse’ polarity FTEs mainly between
11:00 and 14:00Â UT. The two sets of FTEs are consistent with being generated at
the same small region of a subsolar reconnection line. Fast poleward flows were
observed in the 12:00Â MLT sector, near the magnetic footprints of both Cluster and
THEMIS, between 13:00 and 14:00Â UT. However, in this interval the Double Star
TC-1 satellite (situated nearer noon MLT) observed only one FTE suggesting either
that the reconnection line was less active in this region or that some FTEs near
to the subsolar point are not fully formed (Russell et al., 1985; Southwood et al.,
1986). The large separation of the THEMIS spacecraft also allows us to track the
motion of two FTEs across larger distances than the maximum separation of the
Cluster spacecraft, and we find their acceleration to be negligible on this scale,
adding confidence to the results of previous multi-spacecraft analyses of FTEs. |
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