.[1] A survey of dayside 557.7 and 630.0 nm auroral emission, acquired from the all-sky imagers at the Yellow River Station in Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard, shows that the dayside auroral oval could be divided into five auroral active regions: the dawnside (Da, 06:00-07:30 MLT) and duskside (Du,(15)(16)(17):00 MLT) green aurora sectors, the prenoon (W, 07:30-10:00 MLT) and postnoon (H, 13:00-15:30 MLT) peaks for 557.7 and 630.0 nm auroral emissions, and the midday gap (M, 10:00-13:00 MLT) for green aurora. The 630.0 nm intensities in W, M, and H nearly increase linearly with the Kan-Lee electric field. The 630.0 nm auroral emissions in W and H show a double-peak feature associated with the change of interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) clock angle: one peak at 90°and the other at 270°. The 630.0 nm emission in M, however, is dominantly excited during the clock angle of 90°-270°. It is considered that the 630.0 nm emissions in W/H and M are related to the prenoon/postnoon antiparallel reconnection at the high-latitude magnetopause and the subsolar component reconnection, respectively. Moreover, the 630.0 nm intensity in the dayside oval shows the monotonic increase with the absolute value of the north-south oriented electric field (Ez), but the increasing rate of the intensity in the postnoon (prenoon) oval is larger than that in the prenoon (postnoon) oval when IMF By is negative (positive). Only the 557.7 nm intensity in region M and H/Du increases gradually with the absolute value of negative Ez. These features should be associated with the change of interhemispheric currents produced by Ez.
A comprehensive analysis of long-term and multispectral auroral observations made in the Arctic and Antarctica demonstrates that the dayside auroral ovals in two hemispheres are both presented in a two-peak structure, namely, the prenoon 09:00 magnetic local time (MLT) and postnoon 15:00 MLT peaks. The two-peak structures of dayside ovals, however, are asymmetric in the two hemispheres; i.e., the postnoon average auroral intensity is more than the prenoon one in the Northern Hemisphere but less in the Southern Hemisphere. The hemispheric asymmetry cannot be accounted for by the effect of the interplanetary magnetic field B y component and the seasonal difference of ionospheric conductivities in the two hemispheres, which were used to interpret satellite-observed real-time auroral intensity asymmetries in the two hemispheres in previous studies. We suggest that the hemispheric asymmetry is the combined effect of the prenoon-postnoon variations of the magnetosheath density and local ionospheric conductivity.
[1] A one-dimensional, high-latitude ionospheric model is constructed for solving the continuity, momentum, and energy equations numerically. With the assumption that fieldaligned currents (FACs) be carried by thermal electrons in the polar ionosphere, the response of the ionospheric temperature to upward and downward FACs is studied. The results show that at altitudes higher than the F-region maximum, the electron temperature, T e , increases in upward FACs and decreases in downward FACs, consistent with what satellite observations indicate. These changes are caused by expansion/contraction effects due to drift of electrons along magnetic lines of force. It is also shown that T e increases in upward FACs more efficiently than it decreases in downward FACs. In downward FACs the ion temperature, T i , increases, although the response is not as sensitive as that of electrons. For downward FAC cases, T e is also found to increase for a larger magnitude of FACs. In the present calculations, T e decreases only in the magnitude range between 0 and 130 mAm À2 for downward FACs. The temperature increase in upward FAC regions with respect to the background temperature without FACs is not simply linearly related with the intensity of FACs.
We report simultaneous global monitoring of a patch of ionization and in situ observation of ion upflow at the center of the polar cap region during a geomagnetic storm. Our observations indicate strong fluxes of upwelling O+ ions originating from frictional heating produced by rapid antisunward flow of the plasma patch. The statistical results from the crossings of the central polar cap region by Defense Meteorological Satellite Program F16–F18 from 2010 to 2013 confirm that the field‐aligned flow can turn upward when rapid antisunward flows appear, with consequent significant frictional heating of the ions, which overcomes the gravity effect. We suggest that such rapidly moving patches can provide an important source of upwelling ions in a region where downward flows are usually expected. These observations give new insight into the processes of ionosphere‐magnetosphere coupling.
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