Magnetospheric Morphology and Dynamics: Specification of the Near-Earth Operational Environment

摘要

Under the aegis of Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) funding we conducted original research, for example establishing that intense aurora are suppressed by sunlight and that the solar cycle effect on intense aurora is far different than commonly supposed. Applied research has been an increasing focus, however. Recently our AFOSR research has been driven by an effort to characterize the magnetosphere as accurately as possible i.e., to find and develop the most physically significant state variables using data available from the DMSP series satellites. These include a more sophisticated estimate of the open flux in the polar cap (the energy available for explosive release) and a proven technique for determining the first significantly stretched field line (equivalent to the Earthward edge of the current sheet) from DMSP particle precipitation data.