The global statistical response of the outer radiation belt during geomagnetic storms

Murphy, K. R., Watt, C. E. J., Mann, I. R., Jonathan Rae, I., Sibeck, D. G., Boyd, A. J., Forsyth, C. F., Turner, D. L., Claudepierre, S. G., Baker, D. N., Spence, H. E., Reeves, G. D., Blake, J. B. and Fennell, J. (2018) The global statistical response of the outer radiation belt during geomagnetic storms. Geophysical Research Letters, 45 (9). pp. 3783-3792. ISSN 0094-8276 doi: 10.1002/2017GL076674

Abstract/Summary

Using the total radiation belt electron content calculated from Van Allen Probe phase space density (PSD), the time-dependent and global response of the outer radiation belt during storms is statistically studied. Using PSD reduces the impacts of adiabatic changes in the main phase, allowing a separation of adiabatic and non-adiabatic effects, and revealing a clear modality and repeatable sequence of events in storm-time radiation belt electron dynamics. This sequence exhibits an important first adiabatic invariant (mu) dependent behaviour in the seed (150 MeV/G), relativistic (1000 MeV/G), and ultra-relativistic (4000 MeV/G) populations. The outer radiation belt statistically shows an initial phase dominated by loss followed by a second phase of rapid acceleration, whilst the seed population shows little loss and immediate enhancement. The time sequence of the transition to the acceleration is also strongly mu-dependent and occurs at low mu first, appearing to be repeatable from storm to storm.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/76828
Identification Number/DOI	10.1002/2017GL076674
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	American Geophysical Union
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