Heidelberg 2006 – scientific programme
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EP: Extraterrestrische Physik
EP 2: Erdmagnetosph
äre
EP 2.3: Fachvortrag
Monday, March 13, 2006, 16:45–17:00, B
The dayside magnetopause in the spring of 2004: A case study and a statistical report from Cluster — •Adrian Blǎgǎu1,2, Berndt Klecker1, Götz Paschmann1, Manfred Scholer1, Stein Haaland1,3, Octav Marghitu2,1, Iannis Dandouras4, Lynn M. Kistler5, and Elizabeth A. Lucek6 — 1Max-Planck-Institut für extraterrestrische Physik, Garching, Germany — 2Institute for Space Sciences, Bucharest, Romania — 3Department of Physics, University of Bergen, Norway — 4CESR-CNRS, Toulouse, France — 5Space Science Center, University of New Hampshire, Durham, USA — 6Imperial College, London, UK
We discuss a case of dayside magnetopause crossing by Cluster during the spring of 2004. In that period, the trajectories are such that the exit from the magnetosphere in the northen hemisphere is usually at latitudes equatorward of the magnetic cusp. In order to infer its velocity, orientation and thickness, the transition was investigated by single-spacecraft and multi-spacecraft methods. We show results obtained by various techniques - like minimim-variance analysis of the magnetic field, discontinuity analysis and DeHoffmann-Teller analysis - and comment on their consistency. The outcome of these tests for the chosen event indicates that the magnetopause behaves like a rotational discontinuity. We also present a statistical report about the rotational versus tangential character of the dayside magnetopause encounters by Cluster during the spring of 2004.