HR: 1340h
AN: SM23A-0403 [Abstracts]
TI: Cluster Spacecraft Observations of Magnetic Reconnection Separatrix Regions at the Earth's Dayside
Magnetopause.
AU: * Retinò, A
EM: alessandro.retino@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Vaivads, A
EM: andris@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Andre, M
EM: ma@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Khotyaintsev, Y
EM: yuri@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Sahraoui, F
EM: fouad.sahraoui@cetp.ipsl.fr
AF: Centre d'Etude des Environnements Terrestre et Plan‚taires - IPSL, Avenue de l'Europe, 10-12, V‚lizy,
78140
France
AU: Bavassano Cattaneo, M
SM23A-0403
AF: Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario - INAF, Via del Fosso del Cavaliere, Roma, 00133
Italy
AU: Marcucci, M
EM: marcucci@ifsi.rm.cnr.it
AF: Istituto di Fisica dello Spazio Interplanetario - INAF, Via del Fosso del Cavaliere, Roma, 00133
Italy
AU: Pickett, J
EM: pickett@uiowa.edu
AF: Department of Physics and Astronomy -University of Iowa, 203 Van Allen Hall, Iowa City, IA 52242
United States
AU: Morooka, M
EM: michiko@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Owen, C
EM: cjo@mssl.ucl.ac.uk
AF: Mullard Space Science Laboratory, Holmbury St. Mary, Dorking, RH5 6NT
United Kingdom
AU: Buchert, S
EM: scb@irfu.se
AF: Swedish Institute of Space Physics, Box 537, Uppsala, 75121
Sweden
AU: Cornilleau-Wehrlin, N
EM: Nicole.Cornilleau@cetp.ipsl.fr
AF: Centre d'Etude des Environnements Terrestre et Plan‚taires - IPSL, Avenue de l'Europe, 10-12, V‚lizy,
78140
France
AB:
Magnetic reconnection is a process that changes the topology of
the magnetic field and converts magnetic energy into particles
energy. It is considered to be the dominant process that
ultimately allows the transfer of mass, momentum and energy from
the solar wind into the Earth's magnetosphere. Magnetic reconnection is initiated in a microscopic region, the so-called
diffusion region, where plasma and magnetic field are decoupled. The study of the magnetic separatrices, i.e. the magnetic
field lines connected to the X-line, can provide information about the microphysics of the
diffusion region. We present Cluster spacecraft observations of
reconnection close to the X-line and we show that a separatrix
region several ion inertial lengths λi wide can be
identified between the magnetic separatrix and the reconnection
jet on the magnetospheric side of the magnetopause. The separatrix
region contains a few subregions about one λi wide that
are highly structured in the electric field with scales down to the Debye length
λd, even though the X-line can be
up to several tenths of λi away. A comparison with
recent numerical simulations shows a good agreement with our observations
although some observed features are not resolved by the
simulations.
DE: 2723 Magnetic reconnection (7526, 7835)
DE: 2724 Magnetopause and boundary layers
DE: 2772 Plasma waves and instabilities (2471)
DE: 2784 Solar wind/magnetosphere interactions
SC: SPA-Magnetospheric Physics [SM]
MN: Fall Meeting 2005