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Ann. Geophys., 23, 1611-1621, 2005
www.ann-geophys.net/23/1611/2005/
© European Geosciences Union 2005
Relative drift between black aurora and the ionospheric plasma
E. M. Blixt1,3, M. J. Kosch2,4,5, and J. Semeter3
1Department of Physics, University of Tromsø, N-9037 Tromsø, Norway
2Space Vehicles Directorate, Air Force Research Laboratory, Hanscom AFB, Massachusetts, USA
3Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Boston University, USA
4On leave from Communication Systems, Lancaster University, UK
5Honorary Research Fellow, University of Kwazulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa
Abstract. Black auroras are recognized as spatially well-defined regions within
uniform diffuse aurora where the optical emission is significantly reduced.
Although a well studied phenomenon, there is no
generally accepted theory for black auroras. One theory suggests that black
regions are formed when energetic magnetospheric electrons no longer have access
to the loss cone. If this blocking mechanism
drifts with the source electron population in the
magnetosphere, black auroras in the ionosphere should
drift eastward with a velocity
that increases with the energy of the precipitating electrons in the
surrounding aurora,
since the gradient-B curvature drift is energy dependent.
It is the purpose of this paper to test this hypothesis.
To do so we have used simultaneous measurements by the
European Incoherent Scatter (EISCAT) radar and an auroral TV camera at
Tromsø, Norway. We have analyzed 8 periods in
which a black aurora occurred frequently to determine their relative drift
with respect to the ionospheric plasma.
The black aurora was found to drift
eastward with a velocity of 1.5–4km/s, which is in accordance with
earlier observations. However, one case was found where a
black patch was moving westward, this being the first report of such behaviour
in the literature.
In general, the drift was parallel to the ionospheric flow but at a much higher
velocity.
This suggests that the generating mechanism
is not of ionospheric origin. The characteristic energy of the
precipitating electron population was estimated through inversion of
E-region plasma density profiles.
We show that the drift speed
of the black patches increased with the energy of the precipitating
electrons in a way consistent with the gradient-B curvature drift,
suggesting a magnetospheric mechanism for the black aurora.
As expected, a comparison of the drift speeds with a rudimentary dipole
field model of the gradient-B curvature drift speed only yields
order-of-magnitude agreement, which most likely is due to the
nightside disturbed magnetosphere being significantly stretched.
Keywords. Auroral ionosphere; MI interaction; Energetic
particles, precipitating
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