Energetic Electron Measurements Research Articles

ELFIN‐GPS Comparison of Energetic Electron Fluxes: Modeling Low‐Altitude Electron Flux Mapping to the Equatorial Magnetosphere

AbstractNear‐equatorial measurements of energetic electron fluxes, in combination with numerical simulation, are widely used for monitoring of the radiation belt dynamics. However, the long orbital periods of near‐equatorial spacecraft constrain the cadence of observations to once per several hours or greater, that is, much longer than the mesoscale injections and rapid local acceleration and losses of energetic electrons of interest. An alternative approach for radiation belt monitoring is to use measurements of low‐altitude spacecraft, which cover, once per hour or faster, the latitudinal range of the entire radiation belt within a few minutes. Such an approach requires, however, a procedure for mapping the flux from low equatorial pitch angles (near the loss cone) as measured at low altitude, to high equatorial pitch angles (far from the loss cone), as necessitated by equatorial flux models. Here we do this using the high energy resolution ELFIN measurements of energetic electrons. Combining those with GPS measurements we develop a model for the electron anisotropy coefficient, , that describes electron flux dependence on equatorial pitch‐angle, , . We then validate this model by comparing its equatorial predictions from ELFIN with in‐situ near‐equatorial measurements from Arase (ERG) in the outer radiation belt.

Rapid Transport of Energetic Electrons to Low L $L$‐Shells: The Key Role of Electric Fields

AbstractThe dynamics of the outer radiation belt are traditionally associated with wave‐particle resonant interactions, which provide local electron acceleration and losses through very low‐frequency waves, and electron radial transport by ultra‐low frequency waves. However, these processes cannot explain observations of rapid radial transport of energetic electrons (on a time‐scale of a couple of hours), deep into the inner magnetosphere (down to , mapping to magnetic latitude in the ionosphere). This transport is likely associated with strong convection electric fields forming around the plasmapause. To investigate these rapid, low‐latitude electron transport, we combine low‐altitude observations of energetic electron fluxes by the ELFIN CubeSats and DMSP satellites, SuperDARN measurements of ionospheric plasma flows (electric fields), and equatorial measurements of energetic electrons and electric fields by THEMIS. Our findings demonstrate that the rapid filling of the slot region by keV electrons is directly associated with electric field penetration to low latitudes (down to ). The proposed electron transport scenario, the direct penetration of energetic electrons by strong, localized electric fields, underscores the importance of ionosphere‐magnetosphere coupling in radiation belt dynamics.

Can We Intercalibrate Satellite Measurements by Means of Data Assimilation? An Attempt on LEO Satellites

AbstractLow Earth Orbit satellites offer extensive data of the radiation belt region, but utilizing these observations is challenging due to potential contamination and difficulty of intercalibration with spacecraft measurements at Highly Elliptic Orbit that can observe all equatorial pitch‐angles. This study introduces a new intercalibration method for satellite measurements of energetic electrons in the radiation belts using a Data assimilation (DA) approach. We demonstrate our technique by intercalibrating the electron flux measurements of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Polar‐orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites (POES) NOAA‐15,‐16,‐17,‐18,‐19, and MetOp‐02 against Van Allen Probes observations from October 2012 to September 2013. We use a reanalysis of the radiation belts obtained by assimilating Van Allen Probes and Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites observations into 3‐D Versatile Electron Radiation Belt (VERB‐3D) code simulations via a standard Kalman filter. We compare the reanalysis to the POES data set and estimate the flux ratios at each time, location, and energy. From these ratios, we derive energy and L* dependent recalibration coefficients. To validate our results, we analyze on‐orbit conjunctions between POES and Van Allen Probes. The conjunction recalibration coefficients and the data‐assimilative estimated coefficients show strong agreement, indicating that the differences between POES and Van Allen Probes observations remain within a factor of two. Additionally, the use of DA allows for improved statistics, as the possible comparisons are increased 10‐fold. Data‐assimilative intercalibration of satellite observations is an efficient approach that enables intercalibration of large data sets using short periods of data.

Thinning of the Magnetotail Current Sheet Inferred From Low‐Altitude Observations of Energetic Electrons

AbstractThe magnetospheric substorm is a key mode of flux and energy transport throughout the magnetosphere associated with distinct and repeatable magnetotail dynamical processes and plasma injections. The substorm growth phase is characterized by current sheet thinning and magnetic field reconfiguration around the equatorial plane. The global characteristics of current sheet thinning are important for understanding of magnetotail state right before the onset of magnetic reconnection and of the key substorm expansion phase. In this paper, we investigate this thinning at different radial distances using plasma sheet (PS) energetic (>50 keV) electrons that reach from the equator to low altitudes during their fast (∼1 s) travel along magnetic field lines. We perform a multi‐case study and a statistical analysis of 34 events with near‐equatorial observations of the current sheet thinning by equatorial missions and concurrent, latitudinal crossings of the ionospheric projection of the magnetotail by the low‐altitude Electron Losses and Fields Investigation (ELFIN) CubeSats at approximately the same local time sector. Energetic electron fluxes thus collected by ELFIN provide near‐instantaneous (<5 min duration) radial snapshots of magnetotail fluxes. Main findings of this study confirm the previously proposed concepts with low‐altitude energetic electron measurements: (a) Energy distributions of low‐altitude fluxes are quantitatively close to the near‐equatorial distributions, which justifies the investigation of the magnetotail current sheet reconfiguration using low‐altitude measurements. (b) The magnetic field reconfiguration during the current sheet thinning (which lasts ≥ an hour) results in a rapid shrinking of the low‐altitude projection of the entire PS (from near‐Earth, ∼10RE, to the lunar orbit ∼60RE) to 1–2° of magnetic latitude in the ionosphere. (c) The current sheet dipolarization, common during the substorm onset, is associated with a very quick (∼10 min) change of the tail magnetic field configuration to its dipolar state, as implied by a poleward expansion of the PSPS at low altitudes.

An Automatic Identification Method for the Photoelectron Boundary at Mars

Abstract The photoelectron boundary (PEB) at Mars is defined to be the boundary separating the photoelectron-dominated ionosphere from the external plasma environment. Extensive studies have been presented to analyze the PEB variation in the Martian dayside ionosphere. However, the PEB was identified manually in previous studies because of the difficulty in detecting the faint photoelectron features at high altitudes. In this study, we develop an algorithm to detect these faint features and identify the location of PEB from energetic electron measurements automatically. We apply the algorithm to the measurements by the Solar Wind Electron Analyzer instrument on board the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission and identify a total number of 15,681 PEB crossing events accumulated from 2015 January to 2019 October, of which 9169 PEB are on the dayside and 6912 are on the nightside. Our analysis indicates that the altitude of the identified PEB tends to increase with solar extreme ultraviolet radiation and crustal magnetic field strength, in agreement with previous findings. By contrast, the PEB altitude on the nightside tends to increase dramatically with solar zenith angle but is found to be weakly influenced by the crustal magnetic field strength.

Constraints on the Electron Acceleration Process in Solar Flare: A Case Study

AbstractCombining in situ measurements of energetic electrons and remote sensing observations of hard X‐rays and type III radio bursts, we examine the release times of energetic electrons in the July 23, 2016 event. We find that the releases of in situ energetic electrons from the Sun are delayed from those electrons that are responsible for the hard X‐rays. We further find that the release time of in situ electrons is a function of electron energy. Under the assumption that the acceleration mechanism for the upward propagating electrons is of Fermi‐type and is controlled by an energy‐dependent diffusion coefficient, we fit these release times by a simple functional form, related to the turbulence spectral index. Implications of our study on the underlying electron acceleration mechanisms and the magnetic reconnection process in solar flares are discussed. Our results demonstrate the power of the recently developed fractional velocity dispersion analysis (FVDA) method in solar flare studies.

Thermospheric Neutral Winds as the Cause of Drift Shell Distortion in Earth’s Inner Radiation Belt

Recent analysis of energetic electron measurements from the Magnetic Electron Ion Spectrometer instruments onboard the Van Allen Probes showed a local time variation of the equatorial electron intensity in the Earth’s inner radiation belt. The local time asymmetry was interpreted as evidence of drift shell distortion by a large-scale electric field. It was also demonstrated that the inclusion of a simple dawn-to-dusk electric field model improved the agreement between observations and theoretical expectations. Yet, exactly what drives this electric field was left unexplained. We combine in-situ field and particle observations, together with a physics-based coupled model, the Rice Convection Model (RCM) Coupled Thermosphere-Ionosphere-Plasmasphere-electrodynamics (CTIPe), to revisit the local time asymmetry of the equatorial electron intensity observed in the innermost radiation belt. The study is based on the dawn-dusk difference in equatorial electron intensity measured at L = 1.30 during the first 60 days of the year 2014. Analysis of measured equatorial electron intensity in the 150–400 keV energy range, in-situ DC electric field measurements and wind dynamo modeling outputs provide consistent estimates of the order of 6–8 kV for the average dawn-to-dusk electric potential variation. This suggests that the dynamo electric fields produced by tidal motion of upper atmospheric winds flowing across Earth’s magnetic field lines - the quiet time ionospheric wind dynamo - are the main drivers of the drift shell distortion in the Earth’s inner radiation belt.

Harmonization of RBSP and Arase Energetic Electron Measurements Utilizing ESA Radiation Monitor Data

AbstractAccurate measurements of trapped energetic electron fluxes are of major importance for the studies of the complex nature of radiation belts and the characterization of space radiation environment. The harmonization of measurements between different instruments increases the accuracy of scientific studies and the reliability of data‐driven models that treat the specification of space radiation environment. An intercalibration analysis of the energetic electron flux measurements of the Magnetic Electron Ion Spectrometer (MagEIS) and the Relativistic Electron‐Proton Telescope (REPT) instruments on‐board the Van Allen Probes (VAP) Mission versus the measurements of the Extremely High Energy Electron Experiment (XEP) unit on‐board Arase satellite is presented. The performed analysis demonstrates a remarkable agreement between the majority of MagEIS and XEP measurements and suggests the rescaling of MagEIS HIGH unit and of REPT measurements for the treatment of flux spectra discontinuities. The proposed adjustments were validated successfully using measurements from ESA Environmental Monitoring Unit (EMU) on‐board GSAT0207 and the Standard Radiation Monitor (SREM) on‐board INTEGRAL. The derived results lead to the harmonization of science‐class experiments on‐board VAP (2012–2019) and Arase (2017–) and propose the use of the data sets as reference in a series of space weather and space radiation environment developments.

Energetic electron detection packages on board Chinese navigation satellites in MEO

Energetic electron measurements and spacecraft charging are of great significance for theoretical research in space physics and space weather applications. In this paper, the energetic electron detection package (EEDP) deployed on three Chinese navigation satellites in medium Earth orbit (MEO) is reviewed. The instrument was developed by the space science payload team led by Peking University. The EEDP includes a pinhole medium-energy electron spectrometer (MES), a high-energy electron detector (HED) based on ΔE-E telescope technology, and a deep dielectric charging monitor (DDCM). The MES measures the energy spectra of 50−600 keV electrons from nine directions with a 180°×30° field of view (FOV). The HED measures the energy spectrum of 0.5−3.0 MeV electrons from one direction with a 30° cone-angle FOV. The ground test and calibration results indicate that these three sensors exhibit excellent performance. Preliminary observations show that the electron spectra measured by the MES and HED are in good agreement with the results from the magnetic electron-ion spectrometer (MagEIS) of the Van Allen Probes spacecraft, with an average relative deviation of 27.3% for the energy spectra. The charging currents and voltages measured by the DDCM during storms are consistent with the high-energy electron observations of the HED, demonstrating the effectiveness of the DDCM. The observations of the EEDP on board the three MEO satellites can provide important support for theoretical research on the radiation belts and the applications related to space weather.

Energetic charged particle measurements from Voyager 2 at the heliopause and beyond

The long-anticipated encounter by Voyager 2 (V2) of the region between the heliosphere and the very local interstellar medium (VLISM) occurred toward the end of 2018. Here, we report measurements of energetic (>28 keV) charged particles on V2 from the interface region between the heliosheath, dominated by heated solar wind plasma, and the VLISM, expected to contain cold non-solar plasma and the Galactic magnetic field. The number of particles of solar origin began a gradual decrease on 7 August 2018 (118.2 au), while those of Galactic origin (Galactic cosmic rays) increased ~20% in number over a period of a few weeks. An abrupt change occurred on 5 November when V2 was located at 119 au, with a decrease in the number of particles at energies of >28 keV and a corresponding increase in the number of Galactic cosmic rays of energy E > 213 MeV. This signature of the transition to the VLISM resembles, but is very different from, that observed on Voyager 1 at ~121.6 au, associated with the putative crossing of the heliopause some six years earlier. Measurements of energetic ions and electrons with the Low-Energy Charged Particle instrument on Voyager 2 are presented from the boundary of the heliosphere and from the interstellar medium. Voyager 2’s heliopause crossing bears some similarity to that of Voyager 1, despite differing solar wind conditions.

Energetic Electron Acceleration and Injection During Dipolarization Events in Mercury's Magnetotail

AbstractEnergetic particle bursts associated with dipolarization events within Mercury's magnetosphere were first observed by Mariner 10. The events appear analogous to particle injections accompanying dipolarization events at Earth. The Energetic Particle Spectrometer (3 s resolution) aboard MESSENGER determined the particle bursts are composed entirely of electrons with energies ≳ 300 keV. Here we use the Gamma‐Ray Spectrometer high‐time‐resolution (10 ms) energetic electron measurements to examine the relationship between energetic electron injections and magnetic field dipolarization in Mercury's magnetotail. Between March 2013 and April 2015, we identify 2,976 electron burst events within Mercury's magnetotail, 538 of which are closely associated with dipolarization events. These dipolarizations are detected on the basis of their rapid (~2 s) increase in the northward component of the tail magnetic field (ΔBz ~30 nT), which typically persists for ~10 s. Similar to those at Earth, we find that these dipolarizations appear to be low‐entropy, depleted flux tubes convecting planetward following the collapse of the inner magnetotail. We find that electrons experience brief, yet intense, betatron and Fermi acceleration during these dipolarizations, reaching energies ~130 keV and contributing to nightside precipitation. Thermal protons experience only modest betatron acceleration. While only ~25% of energetic electron events in Mercury's magnetotail are directly associated with dipolarization, the remaining events are consistent with the Near‐Mercury Neutral Line model of magnetotail injection and eastward drift about Mercury, finding that electrons may participate in Shabansky‐like closed drifts about the planet. Magnetotail dipolarization may be the dominant source of energetic electron acceleration in Mercury's magnetosphere.

Energetic electron measurements near Enceladus by Cassini during 2005–2015

Enceladus is the main source of neutral and charged particles in the Saturnian magnetosphere. The particles originate at more than 100 active geysers forming a plume above the south pole of the moon and are continuously released into Saturn’s magnetosphere. Therefore the understanding of the interaction of those particles and the local magnetospheric environment of the moon is very important. One technique to study that interaction is to study the typical motion of charged particles in the perturbed plasma flow and the associated magnetic field lines in the vicinity of the moon especially during close flybys. The Cassini spacecraft flew by Enceladus 23 times between 2005 and 2015 at distances between 25 and 5000 km. During some of the flybys Cassini went directly through the south polar plume. Other flybys happened north of the moon or on high-latitude trajectories with respect to the moon.In this paper we present the energetic electron measurements during those flybys obtained by the Low Energy Magnetosphere Measurement System LEMMS, part of the Magnetosphere Imaging Instrument MIMI onboard Cassini (Krimigis et al., 2004). As already shown in Krupp et al. (2012) for the first 14 flybys MIMI/LEMMS typically observes dropouts in the particle intensities in the region of disturbed field lines and in the presence of the moon itself or dense material blocking the bounce and drift motions of the particles. We present in this paper a continuation of the Krupp et al. (2012) results and add a full classification for all 23 flybys using the full data set of energetic electron measurements of MIMI/LEMMS. We distinguish the observed absorption and dust signatures into four different categories: (1) full absorption signatures when all the particles within a fluxtube connecting the spacecraft with the moon are lost onto the moon during one of the particle motions; (2) partial dropouts (ramp-like feature) when not all the particles inside the fluxtube are lost; (3) short dropouts in the fluxes when particles are suddenly lost for a short period in time; and interpret those features as full or partial losses onto the moon or its environment as a result of different plasma and dust regimes in the vicinity of Enceladus. We compare the results with those of Meier et al. (2014) and Engelhardt et al. (2015); (4) In addition we also show dust-related “false electron” measurements for those flybys when Cassini directly went through the dense regions of the south polar plume. Those “dust-peaks” can be interpreted as the result of impacting dust particles inside the LEMMS aperture or nearby creating a plasma cloud.

RFEA Measurements of High-Energy Electrons in a Helicon Plasma Device with Expanding Magnetic Field

In the inductively coupled plasma of the Njord helicon device we have, for the same parameters as for which an ion beam exists, measured a downstream population of high-energy electrons emerging from the source. Separated measurements of energetic tail electrons was carried out by Retarding Field Energy Analyzer (RFEA) with a grounded entrance grid, operated in an electron collection mode. In a radial scan with the RFEA pointed toward the source, we found a significant population of high-energy electrons just inside the magnetic field line mapping to the edge of the source. A second peak in high-energy electrons density was observed in a radial position corresponding to the radius of the source. Also, throughout the main column a small contribution of high-energy electrons was observed. In a radial scan with a RFEA biased to collect ions a localized increase in the plasma ion density near the magnetic field line emerging from the plasma near the wall of the source was observed. This is interpreted as a signature of high-energy electrons ionizing the neutral gas. Also, a dip in the floating potential of a Langmuir probe is evident in this region where high-energy electrons is observed.

Femtosecond dynamics of energetic electrons in high intensity laser-matter interactions.

Highly energetic electrons are generated at the early phases of the interaction of short-pulse high-intensity lasers with solid targets. These escaping particles are identified as the essential core of picosecond-scale phenomena such as laser-based acceleration, surface manipulation, generation of intense magnetic fields and electromagnetic pulses. Increasing the number of the escaping electrons facilitate the late time processes in all cases. Up to now only indirect evidences of these important forerunners have been recorded, thus no detailed study of the governing mechanisms was possible. Here we report, for the first time, direct time-dependent measurements of energetic electrons ejected from solid targets by the interaction with a short-pulse high-intensity laser. We measured electron bunches up to 7 nanocoulombs charge, picosecond duration and 12 megaelectronvolts energy. Our ’snapshots’ capture their evolution with an unprecedented temporal resolution, demonstrat- ing a significant boost in charge and energy of escaping electrons when increasing the geometrical target curvature. These results pave the way toward significant improvement in laser acceleration of ions using shaped targets allowing the future development of small scale laser-ion accelerators.

A new method to study the time correlation between Van Allen Belt electrons and earthquakes

ABSTRACTA new method to study a possible temporal correlation between hundreds of keV Van Allen Belt electrons and strong earthquakes is proposed. It consists in measuring the electrons pitch angle distribution (PAD), searching for PAD disturbances, and studying the time correlation between these PAD disturbances and strong earthquakes, occurring within a defined time window. The method was applied to measurements of energetic electrons, which were performed with the Energetic Particle, Composition, and Thermal Plasma (ECT)-MagEIS detector on board the Van Allen Probes (VAPs) mission and strong continental earthquakes, with magnitude M 5.0 and hypocenter depth 100 km. We report the correlation studies for electrons with energies of about 350 keV, with which a 3.84 standard deviations correlation peak was found at hour time bin, and about 450 keV with which no correlation peaks above 2.0 standard deviations were found. Our work proves the feasibility of the proposed method and the obtained results add useful and additional information with respect to past studies.

Ion‐scale structure in Mercury's magnetopause reconnection diffusion region

AbstractThe strength and time dependence of the electric field in a magnetopause diffusion region relate to the rate of magnetic reconnection between the solar wind and a planetary magnetic field. Here we use ~150 ms measurements of energetic electrons from the Mercury Surface, Space Environment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft observed over Mercury's dayside polar cap boundary (PCB) to infer such small‐scale changes in magnetic topology and reconnection rates. We provide the first direct measurement of open magnetic topology in flux transfer events at Mercury, structures thought to account for a significant portion of the open magnetic flux transport throughout the magnetosphere. In addition, variations in PCB latitude likely correspond to intermittent bursts of ~0.3–3 mV/m reconnection electric fields separated by ~5–10 s, resulting in average and peak normalized dayside reconnection rates of ~0.02 and ~0.2, respectively. These data demonstrate that structure in the magnetopause diffusion region at Mercury occurs at the smallest ion scales relevant to reconnection physics.

Statistics of the field‐aligned currents at the high‐latitude energetic electron boundaries in the nightside: Cluster observation

AbstractMagnetic field disturbances with a clear bipolar signature are frequently observed when the Cluster spacecraft fleet passes through both southern and northern high‐latitude energetic electron boundaries at the nightside magnetosphere. The dominant variation of the bipolar signature is in the azimuthal direction of the local mean field‐aligned coordinate, indicating a field‐aligned current. From 2001 to 2008, we have examined 110 events with the magnetic field and energetic electron measurements. The main results can be summarized as follows: (1) The density and thickness of the field‐aligned current, calculated under the assumption of the one‐dimensional sheet, are in order of tens of nA/m2 and hundreds of kilometers, respectively. (2) Currents flowing into and away from the ionosphere tend to be observed in the postmidnight and premidnight sector, respectively, which have the same polarity as the region 1 current system. (3) These currents mainly distribute in the 60°–75° magnetic latitude region after mapping to the ionosphere. We also find that the current density and corresponding magnetic field variation are positively correlated with the Kp index and solar wind pressure, but almost independent of the AE index.

Solar wind drivers of energetic electron precipitation

AbstractDisturbances of near‐Earth space are predominantly driven by coronal mass ejections (CMEs) mostly originating from sunspots and high‐speed solar wind streams (HSSs) emanating from coronal holes. Here we study the relative importance of CMEs and HSSs as well as slow solar wind in producing energetic electron precipitation. We use the recently corrected energetic electron measurements from the Medium Energy Proton Electron Detector instrument on board low‐altitude NOAA/Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellites from 1979 to 2013. Using solar wind observations categorized into three different flow types, we study the contributions of these flows to annual electron precipitation and their efficiencies in producing precipitation. We find that HSS contribution nearly always dominates over the other flows and peaks strongly in the declining solar cycle phase. CME contribution mostly follows the sunspot cycle but is enhanced also in the declining phase. The efficiency of both HSS and CME peaks in the declining phase. We also study the dependence of electron precipitation on solar wind southward magnetic field component, speed, and density and find that the solar wind speed is the dominant factor affecting the precipitation. Since HSSs enhance the average solar wind speed in the declining phase, they also enhance the efficiency of CMEs during these times and thus have a double effect in enhancing energetic electron precipitation.

The Global Positioning System constellation as a space weather monitor: Comparison of electron measurements with Van Allen Probes data

AbstractEnergetic electron observations in Earth's radiation belts are typically sparse, and multipoint studies often rely on serendipitous conjunctions. This paper establishes the scientific utility of the Combined X‐ray Dosimeter (CXD), currently flown on 19 satellites in the Global Positioning System (GPS) constellation, by cross‐calibrating energetic electron measurements against data from the Van Allen Probes. By breaking our cross calibration into two parts—one that removes any spectral assumptions from the CXD flux calculation and one that compares the energy spectra—we first validate the modeled instrument response functions, then the calculated electron fluxes. Unlike previous forward modeling of energetic electron spectra, we use a combination of four distributions that together capture a wide range of observed spectral shapes. Our two‐step approach allowed us to identify, and correct for, small systematic offsets between block IIR and IIF satellites. Using the Magnetic Electron Ion Spectrometer and Relativistic Electron‐Proton Telescope on Van Allen Probes as a “gold standard,” we demonstrate that the CXD instruments are well understood. A robust statistical analysis shows that CXD and Van Allen Probes fluxes are similar and the measured fluxes from CXD are typically within a factor of 2 of Van Allen Probes at energies 4 MeV. We present data from 17 CXD‐equipped GPS satellites covering the 2015 “St. Patrick's Day” geomagnetic storm to illustrate the scientific applications of such a high data density satellite constellation and therefore demonstrate that the GPS constellation is positioned to enable new insights in inner magnetospheric physics and space weather forecasting.

Injection of relativistic electrons into the internal magnetosphere during magnetic storms: Connection with substorms

The connection between rapid increases in the intensity of electrons with energies >0.3 MeV and magnetospheric substorms was studied for the first time by measurements of energetic electrons on the low-orbit SERVIS-1 satellite. In addition to the well-known process of radial diffusion detected at the recovery phase, the increases during a period of time no longer than 1.5 h at the main phase of six magnetic storms in a channel of 0.3–1.7 MeV (in three of them, in a channel of 1.7–3.4 MeV) were measured. An analysis of auroral zone magnetograms demonstrated that the increases occurred at the instant of magnetospheric substorm activation. A conclusion is made that the increases are caused by the radial injection of electrons by a pulse electric field induced during substorm activations. Pulse injections are shown to be one of the main mechanisms of electron radiation belt completion in the inner magnetosphere and, in combination with moderate radial diffusion, to be responsible for the appearance of large fluxes of energetic electrons (“killers”) in the magnetosphere after magnetic storms.