This Is Auburn

Show simple item record

Dipolarization fronts as earthward propagating flux ropes: A three-dimensional global hybrid simulation


Metadata FieldValueLanguage
dc.contributorYu Lin, linyu01@auburn.eduen_US
dc.creatorLu, San
dc.creatorLin, Yu
dc.creatorWang, Xueyi
dc.creatorWang, Shui
dc.date.accessioned2020-06-03T13:50:02Z
dc.date.available2020-06-03T13:50:02Z
dc.date.created2015-08
dc.identifier10.1002/2015JA021213en_US
dc.identifier.urihttps://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/2015JA021213en_US
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11200/49850
dc.description.abstractDipolarization fronts (DFs) as earthward propagating flux ropes (FRs) in the Earth's magnetotail are presented and investigated with a three-dimensional (3-D) global hybrid simulation for the first time. In the simulation, several small-scale earthward propagating FRs are found to be formed by multiple X line reconnection in the near tail. During their earthward propagation, the magnetic field B-z of the FRs becomes highly asymmetric due to the imbalance of the reconnection rates between the multiple X lines. At the later stage, when the FRs approach the near-Earth dipole-like region, the antireconnection between the southward/negative B-z of the FRs and the northward geomagnetic field leads to the erosion of the southward magnetic flux of the FRs, which further aggravates the B-z asymmetry. Eventually, the FRs merge into the near-Earth region through the antireconnection. These earthward propagating FRs can fully reproduce the observational features of the DFs, e.g., a sharp enhancement of B-z preceded by a smaller amplitude B-z dip, an earthward flow enhancement, the presence of the electric field components in the normal and dawn-dusk directions, and ion energization. Our results show that the earthward propagating FRs can be used to explain the DFs observed in the magnetotail. The thickness of the DFs is on the order of several ion inertial lengths, and the electric field normal to the front is found to be dominated by the Hall physics. During the earthward propagation from the near-tail to the near-Earth region, the speed of the FR/DFs increases from similar to 150km/s to similar to 1000km/s. The FR/DFs can be tilted in the GSM (x,y) plane with respect to the y (dawn-dusk) axis and only extend several Earth radii in this direction. Moreover, the structure and evolution of the FRs/DFs are nonuniform in the dawn-dusk direction, which indicates that the DFs are essentially 3-D.en_US
dc.formatPDFen_US
dc.publisherAMER GEOPHYSICAL UNIONen_US
dc.relation.ispartofJOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-SPACE PHYSICSen_US
dc.relation.ispartofseries2169-9380en_US
dc.subjectdipolarization fronts; flux ropes; three-dimensional global hybrid simulationen_US
dc.subjectCORE FIELD GENERATION; MAGNETIC RECONNECTION; ELECTRON ACCELERATION; PARTICLE SIMULATIONS; CURRENT SHEET; PLASMA SHEET; MAGNETOTAIL; CLUSTER; ENERGIZATION; FLOWen_US
dc.titleDipolarization fronts as earthward propagating flux ropes: A three-dimensional global hybrid simulationen_US
dc.typeTexten_US
dc.type.genreJournal Article, Academic Journalen_US
dc.citation.volume120en_US
dc.citation.issue8en_US
dc.citation.spage6286en_US
dc.citation.epage6300en_US
dc.description.statusPublisheden_US
dc.creator.orcid0000-0001-8003-9252en_US
dc.creator.orcid0000-0001-5533-5981en_US

Files in this item

Show simple item record