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Ann. Geophys., 23, 2867-2875, 2005
www.ann-geophys.net/23/2867/2005/
© European Geosciences Union 2005

Coordinated Cluster/Double Star observations of dayside reconnection signatures

M. W. Dunlop^1,2, M. G. G. T. Taylor³, J. A. Davies¹, C. J. Owen³, F. Pitout⁴, A. N. Fazakerley³, Z. Pu⁵, H. Laakso⁴, Y. V. Bogdanova³, Q.-G. Zong⁶, C. Shen⁷, K. Nykyri², B. Lavraud⁸, S. E. Milan⁹, T. D. Phan¹⁰, H. Rème¹¹, C. P. Escoubet⁴, C. M. Carr², P. Cargill², M. Lockwood¹, and B. Sonnerup^12
1Space Science and Technology Department, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Oxfordshire, OX11 0QX, UK
²The Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College London, London, SW7 2AZ, UK
³Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London, Dorking, Surrey, RH5 6NT, UK
⁴ESA/ESTEC, Keplerlaan 1, 2200 AG Noordwijk, The Netherlands
⁵School of Earth and Space Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
⁶Centre for Space Physics, Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, MA 02215, USA
⁷Centre for Space Science and Applied Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100080, China
⁸Space Science and Applications, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM 87545, USA
⁹Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, Leicester, LE1 7RH, UK
¹⁰Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, California, CA 94720, USA
¹¹Centre d’Etude Spatiale des Rayonnements, Toulouse Cedex 4, France
¹²Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, NH 03755, USA

Abstract. The recent launch of the equatorial spacecraft of the Double Star mission, TC-1, has provided an unprecedented opportunity to monitor the southern hemisphere dayside magnetopause boundary layer in conjunction with northern hemisphere observations by the quartet of Cluster spacecraft. We present first results of one such situation where, on 6 April 2004, both Cluster and the Double Star TC-1 spacecraft were on outbound transits through the dawnside magnetosphere. The observations are consistent with ongoing reconnection on the dayside magnetopause, resulting in a series of flux transfer events (FTEs) seen both at Cluster and TC-1, which appear to lie north and south of the reconnection line, respectively. In fact, the observed polarity and motion of each FTE signature advocates the existence of an active reconnection region consistently located between the positions of Cluster and TC-1, with Cluster observing northward moving FTEs with +/- polarity, whereas TC-1 sees -/+ polarity FTEs. This assertion is further supported by the application of a model designed to track flux tube motion for the prevailing interplanetary conditions. The results from this model show, in addition, that the low-latitude FTE dynamics are sensitive to changes in convected upstream conditions. In particular, changing the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) clock angle in the model suggests that TC-1 should miss the resulting FTEs more often than Cluster and this is borne out by the observations.

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Citation: Dunlop, M. W., Taylor, M. G. G. T., Davies, J. A., Owen, C. J., Pitout, F., Fazakerley, A. N., Pu, Z., Laakso, H., Bogdanova, Y. V., Zong, Q.-G., Shen, C., Nykyri, K., Lavraud, B., Milan, S. E., Phan, T. D., Rème, H., Escoubet, C. P., Carr, C. M., Cargill, P., Lockwood, M., and Sonnerup, B.: Coordinated Cluster/Double Star observations of dayside reconnection signatures, Ann. Geophys., 23, 2867-2875, 2005.   Bibtex   EndNote   Reference Manager