Estimating the location of the open-closed magnetic field line boundary from auroral images

The open-closed magnetic field line boundary (OCB) delimits the region of open magnetic flux forming the polar cap in the Earth’s ionosphere. We present a reliable, automated method for determining the location of the poleward auroral luminosity boundary (PALB) from far ultraviolet (FUV) images of the aurora, which we use as a proxy for the OCB. This technique models latitudinal profiles of auroral luminosity as both a single and double Gaussian function with a quadratic background to produce estimates of the PALB without prior knowledge of the level of auroral activity or of the presence of bifurcation in the auroral oval. We have applied this technique to FUV images recorded by the IMAGE satellite from May 2000 until August 2002 to produce a database of over a million PALB location estimates, which is freely available to download. From this database, we assess and illustrate the accuracy and reliability of this technique during varying geomagnetic conditions. We find that up to 35% of our PALB estimates are made from double Gaussian fits to latitudinal intensity profiles, in preference to single Gaussian fits, in nightside magnetic local time (MLT) sectors. The accuracy of our PALBs as a proxy for the location of the OCB is evaluated by comparison with particle precipitation boundary (PPB) proxies from the DMSP satellites. We demonstrate the value of this technique in estimating the total rate of magnetic reconnection from the time variation of the polar cap area calculated from our OCB estimates

The Auroral Planetary Imaging and Spectroscopy (APIS) service

The Auroral Planetary Imaging and Spectroscopy (APIS) service, accessible online, provides an open and interactive access to processed auroral observations of the outer planets and their satellites. Such observations are of interest for a wide community at the interface between planetology and magnetospheric and heliospheric physics. APIS consists of (i) a high level database, built from planetary auroral observations acquired by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) since 1997 with its mostly used Far-UltraViolet spectro-imagers, (ii) a dedicated search interface aimed at browsing efficiently this database through relevant conditional search criteria and (iii) the ability to interactively work with the data online through plotting tools developed by the Virtual Observatory (VO) community, such as Aladin and Specview. This service is VO compliant and can therefore also been queried by external search tools of the VO community. The diversity of available data and the capability to sort them out by relevant physical criteria shall in particular facilitate statistical studies, on long-term scales and/or multi-instrumental multi-spectral combined analysis

Studies of compositional variations in the thermosphere and ionosphere using far-ultraviolet images from DE-1

Thesis (Ph.D.) University of Alaska Fairbanks, 1998The Dynamics Explorer mission returned a wealth of information from its two orbiting platforms. Of interest here are the three scanning photometers aboard the high-altitude platform DE-1, which obtained hundreds of thousands of global images of Earth, beginning in September of 1981, while using broad- and narrow-band filters to isolate particular terrestrial emissions. The far-ultraviolet (FUV) emissions include the line emissions of OI (130.4 and 135.6 nm) and the band emissions of \rm N\sb2 LBH, the brightness of each yielding information on the composition of the upper atmosphere. The OI emissions are related to the column density of atomic oxygen in the upper-atmosphere as well as the abundance of thermospheric \rm N\sb2, both of which are affected by geomagnetic processes. This thesis presents a model of the DE-1 response to the OI emissions during periods of low geomagnetic activity and uses this model for studies of thermospheric response to geomagnetic storms and substorms. Variations in brightness observed after geomagnetic events are most often seen as decreases corresponding to reduced thermospheric O column densities. The relation between compositional variations in the morning sector at middle latitudes and the orientation of the magnetic field embedded in the solar wind is investigated. The orientation, which strongly affects the circulation of the thermosphere at high latitudes where these variations originate, is shown to be a significant parameter. Variations in brightness within the southern polar cap are investigated in the first study of its kind, demonstrating 20-30% decreases in brightness with the onset of magnetic activity and revealing structure in composition over distances on the order of ${\sim}300$ km. Compositional disturbances are observed immediately after heating takes place, demonstrating for the first time that an FUV instrument can detect changes in thermospheric composition on time scales under one hour. During these events, mid-latitude composition often remains relatively unperturbed. The first survey of FUV images to include ground-based measurements of ionospheric properties demonstrates that decreases in OI brightness correspond to decreases in peak F2 electron densities, known to be related to the ratio of the densities of O and $\rm N\sb2.

Background removal from global auroral images: Data-driven dayglow modeling

Global images of auroras obtained by cameras on spacecraft are a key tool for studying the near-Earth environment. However, the cameras are sensitive not only to auroral emissions produced by precipitating particles, but also to dayglow emissions produced by photoelectrons induced by sunlight. Nightglow emissions and scattered sunlight can contribute to the background signal. To fully utilize such images in space science, background contamination must be removed to isolate the auroral signal. Here we outline a data-driven approach to modeling the background intensity in multiple images by formulating linear inverse problems based on B-splines and spherical harmonics. The approach is robust, flexible, and iteratively deselects outliers, such as auroral emissions. The final model is smooth across the terminator and accounts for slow temporal variations and large-scale asymmetries in the dayglow. We demonstrate the model by using the three far ultraviolet cameras on the Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration (IMAGE) mission. The method can be applied to historical missions and is relevant for upcoming missions, such as the Solar wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer (SMILE) mission

Theoretical and experimental studies relevant to interpretation of auroral emissions

The results obtained in the second year of a three year collaborative effort with MSFC are summarized. A succession of experimental studies was completed to determine the effects of the natural and induced space vehicle environment on the measurement of auroral images from space-based platforms. In addition, a global model which incorporates both auroral and dayglow emission sources is being developed to allow interpretation of measured auroral emissions. A description of work completed on these two tasks is presented

Theoretical and experimental studies relevant to interpretation of auroral emissions

This report describes the accomplishments of a program designed to develop the tools necessary to interpret auroral emissions measured from a space-based platform. The research was divided into two major areas. The first area was a laboratory study designed to improve our understanding of the space vehicle external environment and how it will affect the space-based measurement of auroral emissions. Facilities have been setup and measurements taken to simulate the gas phase environment around a space vehicle; the radiation environment encountered by an orbiting vehicle that passes through the Earth's radiation belts; and the thermal environment of a vehicle in Earth orbit. The second major area of study was a modeling program to develop the capability of using auroral images at various wavelengths to infer the total energy influx and characteristic energy of the incident auroral particles. An ab initio auroral calculation has been added to the extant ionospheric/thermospheric global modeling capabilities within our group. Once the addition of the code was complete, the combined model was used to compare the relative intensities and behavior of various emission sources (dayglow, aurora, etc.). Attached papers included are: 'Laboratory Facility for Simulation of Vehicle-Environment Interactions'; 'Workshop on the Induced Environment of Space Station Freedom'; 'Radiation Damage Effects in Far Ultraviolet Filters and Substrates'; 'Radiation Damage Effects in Far Ultraviolet Filters, Thin Films, and Substrates'; 'Use of FUV Auroral Emissions as Diagnostic Indicators'; and 'Determination of Ionospheric Conductivities from FUV Auroral Emissions'

Planetary auroral imaging

The interaction of the solar wind and the Earth magnetosphere cause auroras. The energetic electrically charged particles, mostly electrons, accelerate along the Earth magnetic field lines into the upper atmosphere, where they collide with gas atoms, causing them to emit light. Some planets also have auroral emission in their characteristic environment. The Jovian magnetosphere is the largest magnetosphere of the solar system and its system is different from the Earth. The auroras on Jupiter can be studied with high sensitivity and resolution by the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Ultraviolet (UV) and far-ultraviolet Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) and Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) instruments. I present the planetary auroral imaging techniques, geometrical transformation and subtraction the airglow model, which can be used as a pre-processing to the image before further process by the VOronoi Image SEgmentation (VOISE) algorithm. VOISE is a dynamic and self-organising algorithm which creates a partition of an image pixel into Voronoi diagram (VD) regions according to prescribed homogeneity criteria. The Jovian auroral image was selected from the APIS database. Using a planetary model, the geometric transformation was performed to get the polar projection, build the airglow model and subtract it from the original to make a clear auroral representation in the two dimensional image

Thermospheric O/N2 Based on DE-1 FUV Dayglow Imaging Data

Work performed during the second half of Year 1 of the contract is summarized. The primary objective of the work is to derive global dayside thermospheric oxygen concentrations from DE-1 far ultraviolet imaging data which we are considering under both magnetically quiet and disturbed times. Work to date has been more qualitative in producing maps showing intensity variations beyond those that can be explained by changes in solar zenith angle (SZA) and look angle across an image (Craven et al., 1995; Meier et al., 1994; Gladstone, 1994). In meeting our primary objective, four tasks have been addressed during the reporting period: (1) Investigating the uniqueness of the relationship between the dayglow emission seen using DE-1's 123 filter (dominated by OI 130.4 nm emission) and the column abundance of O relative to N2 referenced to an N2 depth of 10(exp 17) cm(exp 2); (2) Completion of the algorithm for rapid conversion of DE-1 disk dayglow measurements to O/N2 values; (3) Applying the algorithm to a simulation in which a model DE image was constructed using TIGCM atmospheres. The retrieved image of O/N2 was compared to TIGCM O/N2 obtained by integrations of the TIGCM densities; and (4) Applying the algorithm to selected DE-1 data