HR: 15:25h
AN: SM52C-07    [PDF]
TI: Stormtime Redistribution of the Low-Latitude Ionosphere and the Formation of the Plasmaspheric Bulge
AU: * Foster, J C
EM: jcf@haystack.mit.edu
AF: MIT Haystack Observatory, Atmospheric Sciences Group, Westford, MA 01886 United States
AU: Coster, A J
EM: ajc@haystack.mit.edu
AF: MIT Haystack Observatory, Atmospheric Sciences Group, Westford, MA 01886 United States
AU: Rideout, W C
EM: wrideout@haystack.mit.edu
AF: MIT Haystack Observatory, Atmospheric Sciences Group, Westford, MA 01886 United States
AU: Rich, F J
EM: Frederick.Rich@afrl.af.mil
AF: Air Force Research Laboratory, Hanscom AFB, Bedford, MA 01731 United States
AU: Immel, T
EM: immel@ssl.berkeley.edu
AF: Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720 United States
AB: Ground-based observations of total electron content (TEC) from a global array of GPS receivers are used to map the evolution of the low-latitude ionosphere-plasmasphere system during the onset of strong disturbances.Such images depict a large-scale redistribution of plasma from equatorial latitudes near the dusk terminator to form a region of greatly-enhanced TEC immediately inside the plasmapause between L=2 to 3. The erosion of the plasmasphere and the formation of plumes of storm enhanced density (SED) at mid and high latitudes takes place where the sub auroral polarization stream (SAPS) electric fields overlap this enhanced plasmaspheric bulge region. We combine the GPS maps with overflights of the DMSP satellites and FUV imagery of the equatorial anomaly region from the IMAGE satellite to investigate the causes and development of this inner-magnetospheric stormtime phenomenon. These processes result in a large-scale depletion of the topside ionosphere-plasmasphere over the region of the South Atlantic magnetic anomaly (SAA) and extreme space weather perturbations over the North American continent.
DE: 2415 Equatorial ionosphere
DE: 2431 Ionosphere/magnetosphere interactions (2736)
DE: 2712 Electric fields (2411)
DE: 2768 Plasmasphere
DE: 2788 Storms and substorms
SC: SPA - Magnetospheric Physics [SM]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting