HR: 0800h
AN: SM11A-0329    [Abstracts]
TI: Extreme Drainage of Plasmasphere as Ionosphere Strives to Replenish
AU: * Chen, S
EM: Sheng-Hsien.Chen@gsfc.nasa.gov
AF: Universities Space Research Association and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Geospace Physics Laboratory, Heliophysics Science Division, Code 673, Greenbelt, MD 20771, United States
AU: Moore, T E
EM: Thomas.E.Moore@gsfc.nasa.gov
AF: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Heliophysics Science Division, Code 670, Greenbelt, MD 20771, United States
AB: We present a case study of a global scale restructuring of plasmasphere under an extreme solar wind condition using measurements from THEMIS, Polar, ACE spacecraft, and ground magnetograms. In a case when a coronal mass ejection (CME) with number density 40-60 cm^-3 and dynamic pressure 6-12 nPa interacted with the Earth's magnetic field, we found that a section of plasmasphere disappeared from its usual location as observed by THEMIS, in association with unusual enhancements of ionospheric outflows in the polar cap regions as observed by the Polar spacecraft. In the meantime, large detached regions of dense ions and electrons of plasmaspheric like characteristics were observed along the path of THEMIS as it approached or encountered the magnetosheath plasma at the magnetopause. The event illuminates the formation/erosion of the plasmasphere as well as the physical processes involving the more direct interaction of solar wind and ionospheric plasmas at the magnetopause. We will estimate the rate of the ionospheric outflow and its contribution to the recovery of the plasmasphere and interpret how the plasmaspheric/ionospheric plasma interacts more directly with solar wind plasma at the magnetopause.
DE: 2736 Magnetosphere/ionosphere interactions (2431)
DE: 2768 Plasmasphere
DE: 2776 Polar cap phenomena
DE: 2784 Solar wind/magnetosphere interactions
DE: 2788 Magnetic storms and substorms (7954)
SC: SPA-Magnetospheric Physics [SM]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting