Geotail observations of spiky electric fields and low‐frequency waves in the plasma sheet and plasma sheet boundary

• Published in: Geophysical research letters Vol. 21; no. 25; pp. 2987 - 2990
• Main Authors: Cattell, C., Mozer, F., Tsuruda, K., Hayakawa, H., Nakamura, M., Okada, T., Kokubun, S., Yamamoto, T.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Legacy CDMS American Geophysical Union 15.12.1994; Blackwell Publishing Ltd
• Subjects: Boundaries; Density; Earth, ocean, space; Electric fields; Exact sciences and technology; External geophysics; Geophysics; Geotail spacecraft; Magnetic fields; Magnetopause, cusp, and boundary layers; Magnetospheric Physics; Peak frequency; Physics of the magnetosphere; Spacecraft; Spikes; Magnetospheric tail; Artificial satellite; Electric field; Plasma layer; Boundary layer
• ISSN: 0094-8276; 1944-8007
• DOI: 10.1029/94GL02193

Electric field data from the Geotail spacecraft provide an opportunity to extend the observations of spiky fields made by International Sun Earth Explorer-1 (ISEE-1) to a region of the magnetosphere where quasistatic electric field measurements have not previously been msde, to examine their possible importance in the dynamics of the middle and distant tail, and to test some hypotheses about their formation. In this paper, examples of large fields in the plasma sheet and its boundary at radial distances up to approximately 90 R(sub E) are presented. It is shown that three different types of large electric fields can occur: (1) spiky fields; (2) 'DC' fields; and (3) waves at frequencies comparable to the lower hybrid frequency. There is usually a gradation between (1) and (3), and often large electric field spikes are embedded in regions of lower amplitude waves. The waves tend to occur in short (few to 10's of seconds) packets whose start and stop times are not always correlated with changes in the magnetic field and/or density (as indicated by the spacecraft potential). The peak frequency is often less than but comparable to the lower hybrid frequency in agreement with theories of lower hybrid drift waves in the magnetotail. The largest spikes are not always associated with the largest changes in the spacecraft potential and/or magnetic field. It is suggested that the spiky fields may represent the nonlinear development of the waves.