Magnetic pulsation behaviour in the magnetosphere inferred from whistler mode signals

Abstract

During a long series of recordings of the Doppler shift of signals from NLK, Seattle, which have propagated in ducts in the whistler mode, a number of occasions have been noted where the duct has been acted on by the electric field of micropulsation events in the Pc4–5 range. Large oscillations are produced in the Doppler shift of the received VLF signal. It is shown that the field line has an antinode of motion in the equatorial plane, and that the Doppler shift is responding almost entirely to the radial component of the duct motion. The latter enables a comparison to be made between the magnetic disturbance in the magnetosphere and that seen on the ground. Some support is given to the prediction of Hughes (1974) and Inoue (1973) that the magnetospheric disturbance vector when seen on the ground is rotated 90° by the currents induced in the ionosphere. Models of the oscillating field line enable an estimate to be made of the azimuthal component of the electric field in the equatorial plane. This is typically 1 mV m . The model also predicts the north-south magnetic field strength of the transverse standing wave at the base of the magnetosphere, and this value may be compared with that seen on the ground. Values of the order 1–2 times the ground H-component or 5–10 times the ground D-component were found.