Hongqiao Hu

Direct Observations of the Evolution of Polar Cap Ionization Patches

Patchy Polar Cap Patches of enhanced density plasma in the polar ionosphere (or polar cap patches) disturb radio communications and satellite positioning at high latitudes during magnetospheric storms. Using data from Global Positioning System satellites and a high-frequency radar network, Q.-H. Zhang et al. (p. 1597) analyzed a magnetospheric storm driven by a strong coronal mass ejection from the Sun and followed the evolution and motion of a patch of ionization throughout the polar cap. The localized dayside flow response to the solar disturbance allowed a patch to be stored and grow in the dayside polar cap, and the gaps between patches were controlled by the onset of magnetic reconnection in the magnetospheres tail. Observations of ionospheric perturbations after a solar burst hit Earth show how a patch of ionization formed and evolved. Patches of ionization are common in the polar ionosphere, where their motion and associated density gradients give variable disturbances to high-frequency (HF) radio communications, over-the-horizon radar location errors, and disruption and errors to satellite navigation and communication. Their formation and evolution are poorly understood, particularly under disturbed space weather conditions. We report direct observations of the full evolution of patches during a geomagnetic storm, including formation, polar cap entry, transpolar evolution, polar cap exit, and sunward return flow. Our observations show that modulation of nightside reconnection in the substorm cycle of the magnetosphere helps form the gaps between patches where steady convection would give a “tongue” of ionization (TOI).

Hemispheric asymmetry of the structure of dayside auroral oval

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 By 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.

An extensive survey of dayside diffuse aurora based on optical observations at Yellow River Station

By using 7 years optical auroral observations obtained at Yellow River Station (magnetic latitude 76.24°N) at Ny-Alesund, Svalbard, we performed the first extensive survey for the dayside diffuse auroras (DDAs) and acquired observational results as follows. (1) The DDAs can be classified into two broad categories, i.e., unstructured and structured DDAs. The unstructured DDAs are mainly distributed in morning and afternoon, but the structured DDAs predominantly occurred around the magnetic local noon (MLN). (2) The unstructured DDAs observed in morning and afternoon present obviously different properties. The afternoon ones are much stable and seldom show pulsating property. (3) The DDAs are more easily observed under geomagnetically quiet times. (4) The structured DDAs mainly show patchy, stripy, and irregular forms and are often pulsating and drifting. The drifting directions are mostly westward (with speed ~5 km/s), but there are cases showing eastward or poleward drifting. (5) The stripy DDAs are exclusively observed near the MLN and, most importantly, their alignments are confirmed to be consistent with the direction of ionospheric convection near the MLN. (6) A new auroral form, called throat aurora, is found to be developed from the stripy DDAs. Based on the observational results and previous studies, we proposed our explanations to the DDAs. We suggest that the unstructured DDAs observed in the morning are extensions of the nightside diffuse aurora to the dayside, but that observed in the afternoon are predominantly caused by proton precipitations. The structured DDAs occurred near the MLN are caused by interactions of cold plasma structures, which are supposed to be originated from the ionospheric outflows or plasmaspheric drainage plumes, with hot electrons from the plasma sheet. We suppose that the cold plasma structures for producing the patchy DDAs are in lumpy and are more likely from the plasmaspheric drainage plumes. The cold plasma structure for producing the stripy DDAs should be in wedge like and is generated by conveying the cold plasmas from lower L-shell toward higher L-shell with magnetospheric convection, and that for producing the irregular DDAs is resulted from deforming the wedge-like structure by disturbance. The throat aurora is supposed to be projection of a newly opened flux of reconnection. In addition, we also found that structured DDAs correspond to structured electron precipitations in the ionosphere, which implies that the cold plasma structures in the magnetosphere are magnetically mapped to the ionosphere and act as a duct for producing the structured DDAs. We argue that we have presented some new observational results about DDA in this paper, which will be useful for fully understanding the DDAs.

Polar cap patch transportation beyond the classic scenario

We report the continuous monitoring of a polar cap patch, encompassing its creation and a subsequent evolution that differs from the classic behviour. The patch was formed from the storm enhanced density (SED) plume, by segmentation associated with a subauroral polarization stream (SAPS) generated by a substorm. Its initial anti-sunward motion was halted due to a rapidly changing of interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) conditions from strong southward to strong eastward with weaker northward components and the patch subsequently very slowly evolved behind the duskside of a lobe reverse convection cell in afternoon sectors, associated with high-latitude lobe reconnection, much of it fading rapidly due to an enhancement of the ionization recombination rate. This differs from the classic scenario where polar cap patches are transported across the polar cap along the streamlines of twin-cell convection pattern from day to night. This observation provides us new important insights into patch formation and control by the IMF, which has to be taken into account in F-region transport models and space weather forecasts.

Simultaneous ground-based optical and SuperDARN observations of the shock aurora at MLT noon

Using ground-based high temporal and spatial optical aurora observations, we investigated one fortuitous event to illustrate the direct responses of the fine structure auroral emission to interplanetary shock on 7 January 2005. During the shock impact to the magnetosphere, the Chinese Arctic Yellow River Station (YRS) equipped with all-sky imagers (ASIs) was situated at the magnetic local noon region (~1210 MLT) in the Northern Hemisphere, while the SuperDARN CUTLASS Finland HF radar covering the field of view (FOV) of the ASIs at YRS had fine ionospheric plasma convection measurement. We observed that an intensified red aurora manifesting as a discrete emission band at a higher latitude responds to the shock impact gradually, which results in a distinct broadening of the dayside auroral oval due to the equatorward shifting of its lower latitude boundary after the shock arrival. In contrast, the green diffuse aurora, manifesting as a relatively uniform luminosity structure, reacts immediately to the shock compression, displaying prompt appearance in the southern edge of the FOV and subsequent poleward propagation of its higher latitude boundary. Simultaneously, the CUTLASS Finland radar monitored enhanced backscatter echo power and increased echo number, which coincided with intensified discrete aurora in approximately the same latitudinal region. Doppler velocity measurement showed moving ionospheric irregularities with generally enhanced line-of-sight (LOS) speed, but with prominent sunward flow in the polar cap and antisunward flow in both the eastern and western regions. The SuperDARN global ionospheric convection pattern clearly presented a large-scale plasma flow divided in four circulation cells, with two reversed flow cells nested in the noon sector of the polar cap. These direct observations strongly suggest that the prompt shock compression intensified the wave-particle interaction in the inner magnetosphere and enhanced the lobe magnetic reconnection rate at magnetospheric high latitude.

Absorption events associated with solar flares

During the upward period of solar cycle 23, the Imaging Riometer at Zhongshan, Antarctica (geomag. lat. 74.5 S) was used to study the solar proton events and the Xray solar flares which are associated with the absorption events. In our study, the relationship between the absorption intensity and X-ray flux is found in a power form which is consistent with the theoretical result. The imaging riometer absorption data at Ny-Ålesund, Svalbard reconfirm the above relationship. We also argue that only M-class flares can generate a significant daytime absorption.

Magnetic ramp scale at supercritical perpendicular collisionless shocks: Full particle electromagnetic simulations

Supercritical perpendicular collisionless shocks are known to exhibit foot, ramp, and overshoot structures. The shock ramp structure is in a smaller scale in contrast to other microstructures (foot and overshoot) within the shock front. One-dimensional full particle simulations of strictly perpendicular shocks over wide ranges of ion beta βi, Alfven Mach number MA, and ion-to-electron mass ratio mi/me are presented to investigate the impact of plasma parameters on the shock ramp scale. Main results are (1) the ramp scale can be as small as several electron inertial length. (2) The simulations suggest that in a regime below the critical ion beta value, the shock front undergoes a periodic self-reformation and the shock ramp scale is time-varying. At higher ion beta values, the shock front self-reformation is smeared. At still higher ion beta value, the motion of reflected ions is quite diffuse so that they can lead to a quasi-steady shock ramp. Throughout the above three conditions, the shock ramp thicknes...

F-lacuna at cusp latitude and its associated TEC variation

As a frequent phenomenon occurring during summer days in high-latitude ionosphere, the F-lacuna manifests itself as disappearance of F region ionogram traces. Based on the 7.5 min interval Digisonde ionograms recorded at Zhongshan station (69.4°S, 76.4°E geographic coordinates; 74.5°S, 96.0°E corrected geomagnetic coordinates), we present temporal characteristics of the F-lacuna, as well as its correlation with geomagnetic activity, interplanetary magnetic field, and colocated TEC. Magnetic Local Time (MLT) distribution of the F-lacuna occurrence exhibits a dawn-dusk asymmetry. All types of F-lacuna favor the dawn sector, mainly occurring at 08:00–11:00MLT for F1 and total lacuna, 6:00–8:00MLT for F2-lacuna. The magnetic activity is found to have a strong positive correlation with the F2 and total lacuna. F2-lacuna occurrence is favored by southward component of interplanetary magnetic field (IMF), and total lacuna by high values of either eastward or westward component. It is worth to mention that the F-lacuna associates with the simultaneous total electron content (TEC) condition which has a positive correlation with F1-lacuna occurrence, while a strong negative correlation with the F2 and total lacuna. The associated TEC variation may provide a significant evidence for interpreting the F-lacuna phenomenon.

Diurnal variation of winter F-region ionosphere for solar minimum at both Zhongshan Station, Antarctica and Svalbard Station, Arctic†

Diurnal variation features of winter-time F2-peak electron density (NmF2) representative for solar minimum at both Zhongshan station, Antarctica, and Svalbard station, are compared and analyzed. Both stations are located around cusp latitude, and are almost on the same geomagnetic meridian plane in both hemispheres. For quiet time period, typical NmF2 diurnal variation features at Svalbard station show double peaks with a decrease of NmF2 around magnetic local noon (~UT+3 hour), NmF2 diurnal variation at Zhongshan station shows one major peak around magnetic local noon (~UT+1.75 hour), followed by a sharp decrease of NmF2 and a subpeak around 1500 UT. Simulation results of the high-latitude ionospheres in both hemispheres agree well with observations at both stations. It is found that the major difference of NmF2 variation between both stations can be explained by the unique location of each station relative to the sunlit demarcation line during the day. For quiet time period, photoionization from lower latitude contributes to the major peak of NmF2 in the diurnal variation at Zhongshan station, while the interaction between horizontal convection and auroral precipitation is the main cause for NmF2 variation at Svalbard station. For active time period, both stations show the increase of NmF2 due to transportation of higher plasma density from lower latitudes on the dayside with the expansion of the polar cap, and the additional ionization from soft precipitating electrons.

A mechanism to explain the variations of tropopause and tropopause inversion layer in the Arctic region during a sudden stratospheric warming in 2009

The mechanism to explain the variations of tropopause and tropopause inversion layer (TIL) in the Arctic region during a sudden stratospheric warming (SSW) in 2009 was studied with the Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications reanalysis data and GPS/Constellation Observing system for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate (COSMIC) temperature data. During the prominent SSW in 2009, the cyclonic system changed to the anticyclonic system due to the planetary wave with wave number 2 (wave2). The GPS/COSMIC temperature data showed that during the SSW in 2009, the tropopause height in the Arctic decreased accompanied with the tropopause temperature increase and the TIL enhancement. The variations of the tropopause and TIL were larger in higher latitudes. A static stability analysis showed that the variations of the tropopause and TIL were associated with the variations of the residual circulation and the static stability due to the SSW. Larger static stability appeared in the upper stratosphere and moved downward to the narrow region just above the tropopause. The descent of strong downward flow was faster in higher latitudes. The static stability tendency analysis showed that the strong downward residual flow induced the static stability change in the stratosphere and around the tropopause. The strong downwelling in the stratosphere was mainly induced by wave2, which led to the tropopause height and temperature changes due to the adiabatic heating. Around the tropopause, a pair of downwelling above the tropopause and upwelling below the tropopause due to wave2 contributed to the enhancement of static stability in the TIL immediately after the SSW.