NASA Logo

NTRS

NTRS - NASA Technical Reports Server

Back to Results
C/NOFS Measurements of Magnetic Perturbations in the Low-Latitude Ionosphere During Magnetic StormsThe Vector Electric Field Investigation suite on the C/NOFS satellite includes a fluxgate magnetometer to monitor the Earth s magnetic fields in the low-latitude ionosphere. Measurements yield full magnetic vectors every second over the range of +/-45,000 nT with a one-bit resolution of 1.37 nT (16 bit A/D) in each component. The sensor s primary responsibility is to support calculations of both V x B and E x B with greater accuracy than can be obtained using standard magnetic field models. The data also contain information about large-scale current systems that, when analyzed in conjunction with electric field measurements, promise to significantly expand understanding of equatorial electrodynamics. We first compare in situ measurements with the POMME (Potsdam Magnetic Model of the Earth) model to establish in-flight sensor "calibrations" and to compute magnetic residuals. At low latitudes the residuals are predominately products of the storm time ring current. Since C/NOFS provides a complete coverage of all local times every 97 min, magnetic field data allow studies of the temporal evolution and local time variations of storm time ring current. The analysis demonstrates the feasibility of using instrumented spacecraft in low-inclination orbits to extract a timely proxy for the provisional Dst index and to specify the ring current s evolution.
Document ID
20120010362
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
External Source(s)
Authors
Le, Guan
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD, United States)
Burke, William J.
(Air Force Research Lab. Hanscom AFB, MA, United States)
Pfaff, Robert F.
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD, United States)
Freudenreich, Henry
(NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, MD, United States)
Maus, Stefan
(National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Boulder, CO, United States)
Luhr, Hermann
(GeoForschungsZentrum Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany)
Date Acquired
August 26, 2013
Publication Date
December 28, 2011
Subject Category
Meteorology And Climatology
Report/Patent Number
GSFC.JA.00447.2012
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

Available Downloads

There are no available downloads for this record.
No Preview Available