Statistical X ray auroral emissions – PIXIE observations

Abstract

The Polar Ionospheric X ray Imaging Experiment (PIXIE) on board the NASA/GGS POLAR spacecraft has been making observations of X rays emitted simultaneously over the entire auroral zone since March, 1996. PIXIE remotely senses the bremsstrahlung produced by the loss of multi‐keV electrons from the magnetosphere into the ionosphere. In this study we examine twenty‐six months (April 1996 – July 1998) of X ray observations of the northern auroral region from the PIXIE instrument. X ray flux is obtained from the PIXIE observations, which allows us to produce for the first time synoptic auroral maps representing the precipitation of energetic electrons, as a function of geomagnetic activity.