Abstract. The Cluster fleet offers the first possibility of comparing non-thermal terrestrial continuum radiation from similarly equipped nearby observation points. A very rich data set has already been acquired on the Cluster polar orbit, between 4 and 19 Earth radii geocentric distances, and preliminary analysis has been carried out on these emissions. We focus in this paper on direction finding performed from all four spacecraft as a means to locate the position of the sources of this continuum radiation. Directions are derived from spin modulation properties, under the usual analysis assumptions of the wave vector of the radiation lying in the plane containing the spin axis and the antenna position at electric field minimum. All the spin axes of the four Cluster spacecraft are aligned perpendicular to the ecliptic, thus the aligned spacecraft antenna spin planes provide redundant 2-D views of the propagation path of the radiation and source location. Convincing 2-D triangulation results have been obtained in the vicinity of the source region. In addition, the out of spin plane component of the wave vector reveals itself to a certain extent through directivity characteristics compared at different distances of the spin plane to the ecliptic. The four case events studied (two of them taken near apogee, the other two near perigee) have confirmed general properties derived from previous observations: trapping in the lower frequency range, radiation escaping into the magnetosheath region in the higher frequency range. All propagation directions are compatible with source positions in the plasmapause region, however, at a significant distance from the equator in one case. Our observations have also revealed new properties, like the importance of small-scale density irregularities in the local amplification of continuum radiation. We conclude that more detailed generation and propagation models are needed to fit the observations.
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Abstract.Proceeding with the analysis of Amata et al. (2005), we suggest that the general feature for the local transport at a thin magnetopause (MP) consists of the penetration of ions from the magnetosheath with gyroradius larger than the MP width, and that, in crossing it, the transverse potential difference at the thin current sheet (TCS) is acquired by these ions, providing a field-particle energy exchange without parallel electric fields. It is suggested that a part of the surface charge is self-consistently produced by deflection of ions in the course of inertial drift in the nonuniform electric field at MP.Consideration of the partial moments of ions with different energies demonstrates that the protons having gyroradii of roughly the same size or larger than the MP width carry fluxes normal to MP that are about 20% of the total flow in the plasma jet under MP. This is close to the excess of the ion transverse velocity over the cross-field drift speed in the plasma flow just inside MP (Amata et al., 2005), which conforms to the contribution of the finite-gyroradius inflow across MP. A linkage through the TCS between different plasmas results from the momentum conservation of the Correspondence to: S. Savin (ssavin@iki.rssi.ru) higher-energy ions. If the finite-gyroradius penetration occurs along the MP over ∼1.5 R E from the observation site, then it can completely account for the formation of the jet under the MP. To provide the downstream acceleration of the flow near the MP via the cross-field drift, the weak magnetic field is suggested to rotate from its nearly parallel direction to the unperturbed flow toward being almost perpendicular to the accelerated flow near the MP.We discuss a deceleration of the higher-energy ions in the MP normal direction due to the interaction with finite-scale electric field bursts in the magnetosheath flow frame, equivalent to collisions, providing a charge separation. These effective collisions, with a nonlinear frequency proxy of the order of the proton cyclotron one, in extended turbulent zones are a promising alternative in place of the usual parallel electric fields invoked in the macro-reconnection scenarios. Further cascading towards electron scales is supposed to be due to unstable parallel electron currents, which neutralize the potential differences, either resulted from the ion-burst interactions or from the inertial drift.The complicated MP shape suggests its systematic velocity departure from the local normal towards the average one, inferring domination for the MP movement of the non-local processes over the small-scale local ones.Published by Copernicus GmbH on behalf of the European Geosciences Union and the American Geophysical Union. The measured Poynting vector indicates energy transmission from the MP into the upstream region with the waves triggering impulsive downstream flows, providing an input into the local flow balance and the outward movement of the MP.Equating the transverse electric field inside the MP TCS by the Hall term in the Ohm's law ...
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