Crystal clear: The social determinants of gay men's use of crystal methamphetamine in Victoria

This monograph offers a comparative analysis of epidemiological, behavioural and social research on crystal methamphetamine use among gay men living in Melbourne and gay men living in other urban centres in Australia, the US, and the UK. It includes a survey of local expert opinion regarding the scale and scope of problematic crystal methamphetamine use among gay men resident in Victoria and a review of current crystal methamphetamine treatment and prevention options for gay men. It provides a framework for the development of a coordinated research, policy and program response that will reduce the harms to gay men associated with the use of crystal methamphetamine and other illicit drugs. &nbsp

Tomographic Reconstruction of Mercury's Exosphere from MESSENGER Flyby Data

The exosphere of Mercury is among the best-studied examples of a common type of atmosphere, a surface-bounded exosphere. Mercury's exosphere was probed in 2008-2009 with Ultraviolet and Visible Spectrometer (UVVS) measurements obtained during three planetary flybys by the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft [1-3]. The measurements detailed the distribution of two previously known metallic constituents of Mercury's exosphere, Na and Ca, and indicated the presence in the gas phase of yet another metallic species, Mg. Such measurements can answer fundamental scientific questions regarding the relative importance of possible source and loss processes for exospheric species ejected from a surface boundary [4]. The trajectory of MESSENGER during the last of its three flybys provided the best spatial coverage prior to orbit insertion. The measurements by MESSENGER of Na, Ca, and Mg during the third flyby have been analyzed with a novel tomographic method. This approach maximizes the amount of information that can be extracted from line-of-sight measurements because it yields three-dimensional distributions of neutrals consistent with the data

Global Distribution of Mercury's Neutrals from MESSENGER Measurements Combined with a Tomographic Method

The MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft entered orbit about Mercury on March 18, 2011. Since then, the Ultraviolet and Visible Spectrometer (UVVS) onboard this spacecraft has been observing Mercury's collisionless exosphere. We present measurements by MESSENGER UVVS of the sodium, calcium, and magnesium distributions that were obtained during multiple passes through the tail over a period of one month. Global maps of the exosphere were constructed daily from such measurements using a recently developed tomographic technique. During this period, Mercury moved towards the Sun from being about 0.44 astronomical units (AU) to approximately 0.32 AU from the Sun. Hence, our reconstructions provide information about the three-dimensional structure of the exosphere, the source processes for these species, and their dependence with orbital distance during the entire in-leg of Mercury's orbit

Survey of Coherent Approximately 1 Hz Waves in Mercury's Inner Magnetosphere from MESSENGER Observations

We summarize observations by the MESSENGER spacecraft of highly coherent waves at frequencies between 0.4 and 5 Hz in Mercury's inner magnetosphere. This survey covers the time period from 24 March to 25 September 2011, or 2.1 Mercury years. These waves typically exhibit banded harmonic structure that drifts in frequency as the spacecraft traverses the magnetic equator. The waves are seen at all magnetic local times, but their observed rate of occurrence is much less on the dayside, at least in part the result of MESSENGER's orbit. On the nightside, on average, wave power is maximum near the equator and decreases with increasing magnetic latitude, consistent with an equatorial source. When the spacecraft traverses the plasma sheet during its equatorial crossings, wave power is a factor of 2 larger than for equatorial crossings that do not cross the plasma sheet. The waves are highly transverse at large magnetic latitudes but are more compressional near the equator. However, at the equator the transverse component of these waves increases relative to the compressional component as the degree of polarization decreases. Also, there is a substantial minority of events that are transverse at all magnetic latitudes, including the equator. A few of these latter events could be interpreted as ion cyclotron waves. In general, the waves tend to be strongly linear and characterized by values of the ellipticity less than 0.3 and wave-normal angles peaked near 90 deg. Their maxima in wave power at the equator coupled with their narrow-band character suggests that these waves might be generated locally in loss cone plasma characterized by high values of the ratio beta of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure. Presumably both electromagnetic ion cyclotron waves and electromagnetic ion Bernstein waves can be generated by ion loss cone distributions. If proton beta decreases with increasing magnetic latitude along a field line, then electromagnetic ion Bernstein waves are predicted to transition from compressional to transverse, a pattern consistent with our observations. We hypothesize that these local instabilities can lead to enhanced ion precipitation and directly feed field-line resonances

Structure and dynamics of Mercury’s magnetospheric cusp: MESSENGER measurements of protons and planetary ions

The MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft has observed the northern magnetospheric cusp of Mercury regularly since the probe was inserted into orbit about the innermost planet in March 2011. Observations from the Fast Imaging Plasma Spectrometer (FIPS) made at altitudes 10 cm−3) that are exceeded only by those observed in the magnetosheath. These high plasma densities are also associated with strong diamagnetic depressions observed by MESSENGER's Magnetometer. Plasma in the cusp may originate from several sources: (1) Direct inflow from the magnetosheath, (2) locally produced planetary photoions and ions sputtered off the surface from solar wind impact and then accelerated upward, and (3) flow of magnetosheath and magnetospheric plasma accelerated from dayside reconnection X-lines. We surveyed 518 cusp passes by MESSENGER, focusing on the spatial distribution, energy spectra, and pitch-angle distributions of protons and Na+-group ions. Of those, we selected 77 cusp passes during which substantial Na+-group ion populations were present for a more detailed analysis. We find that Mercury's cusp is a highly dynamic region, both in spatial extent and plasma composition and energies. From the three-dimensional plasma distributions observed by FIPS, protons with mean energies of 1 keV were found flowing down into the cusp (i.e., source (1) above). The distribution of pitch angles of these protons showed a depletion in the direction away from the surface, indicating that ions within 40° of the magnetic field direction are in the loss cone, lost to the surface rather than being reflected by the magnetic field. In contrast, Na+-group ions show two distinct behaviors depending on their energy. Low-energy (100–300 eV) ions appear to be streaming out of the cusp, showing pitch-angle distributions with a strong component antiparallel to the magnetic field (away from the surface). These ions appear to have been generated in the cusp and accelerated locally (i.e., source (2) above). Higher-energy (≥1 keV) Na+-group ions in the cusp exhibit much larger perpendicular components in their energy distributions. During active times, as judged by frequent, large-amplitude magnetic field fluctuations, many more Na+-group ions are measured at latitudes south of the cusp. In several cases, these Na+-group ions in the dayside magnetosphere are flowing northward toward the cusp. The high mean energy, pitch-angle distributions, and large number of Na+-group ions on dayside magnetospheric field lines are inconsistent with direct transport into the cusp of sputtered ions from the surface or newly photoionized particles. Furthermore, the highest densities and mean energies often occur together with high-amplitude magnetic fluctuations, attributed to flux transfer events along the magnetopause. These results indicate that high-energy Na+-group ions in the cusp are likely formed by ionization of escaping neutral Na in the outer dayside magnetosphere and the magnetosheath followed by acceleration and transport into the cusp by reconnection at the subsolar magnetopause (i.e., source 3 above)

The Velocity Distribution of Pickup He+ Measured at 3.0 AU By Messenger

During its interplanetary trajectory in 2007–2009, the MErcury Surface, Space ENvrionment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft passed through the gravitational focusing cone for interstellar helium multiple times at a heliocentric distance R ≈ 0.3 AU. Observations of He+ interstellar pickup ions made by the Fast Imaging Plasma Spectrometer sensor on MESSENGER during these transits provide a glimpse into the structure of newly formed inner heliospheric pickup-ion distributions. This close to the Sun, these ions are picked up in a nearly radial interplanetary magnetic field. Compared with the near-Earth environment, pickup ions observed near 0.3 AU will not have had sufficient time to be energized substantially. Such an environment results in a nearly pristine velocity distribution function that should depend only on pickup-ion injection velocities (related to the interstellar gas), pitch-angle scattering, and cooling processes. From measured energy-per-charge spectra obtained during multiple spacecraft observational geometries, we have deduced the phase-space density of He+ as a function of magnetic pitch angle. Our measurements are most consistent with a distribution that decreases nearly monotonically with increasing pitch angle, rather than the more commonly modeled isotropic or hemispherically symmetric forms. These results imply that pitch-angle scattering of He+ may not be instantaneous, as is often assumed, and instead may reflect the velocity distribution of initially injected particles. In a slow solar wind stream, we find a parallel-scattering mean free path of λ ∼ 0.1 AU and a He+ production rate of ∼0.05 m−3 s−1 within 0.3 AU

MESSENGER orbital observations of large‐amplitude Kelvin‐Helmholtz waves at Mercury's magnetopause

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/95418/1/jgra21747.pd

MESSENGER and Mariner 10 flyby observations of magnetotail structure and dynamics at Mercury

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/94896/1/jgra21525.pd

Mercury's Magnetopause and Bow Shock from MESSENGER Magnetometer Observations

We have established the average shape and location of Mercury's magnetopause and bow shock from orbital observations by the MESSENGER Magnetometer. We fit empirical models to midpoints of boundary crossings and probability density maps of the magnetopause and bow shock positions. The magnetopause was fit by a surface for which the position R from the planetary dipole varies as [1 + cos(theta)]-alpha, where theta is the angle between R and the dipole-Sun line, the subsolar standoff distance Rss is 1.45 RM (where RM is Mercury's radius), and the flaring parameter alpha = 0.5. The average magnetopause shape and location were determined under a mean solar wind ram pressure PRam of 14.3 nPa. The best fit bow shock shape established under an average Alfvén Mach number (MA) of 6.6 is described by a hyperboloid having Rss = 1.96 RM and an eccentricity of 1.02. These boundaries move as PRam and MA vary, but their shapes remain unchanged. The magnetopause Rss varies from 1.55 to 1.35 RM for PRam in the range of 8.8-21.6 nPa. The bow shock Rss varies from 2.29 to 1.89 RM for MA in the range of 4.12-11.8. The boundaries are well approximated by figures of revolution. Additional quantifiable effects of the interplanetary magnetic field are masked by the large dynamic variability of these boundaries. The magnetotail surface is nearly cylindrical, with a radius of ~2.7 RM at a distance of 3 RM downstream of Mercury. By comparison, Earth's magnetotail flaring continues until a downstream distance of ~10 Rss

Magnetic flux pileup and plasma depletion in Mercury’s subsolar magnetosheath

Measurements from the Fast Imaging Plasma Spectrometer (FIPS) and Magnetometer (MAG) on the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging spacecraft during 40 orbits about Mercury are used to characterize the plasma depletion layer just exterior to the planet’s dayside magnetopause. A plasma depletion layer forms at Mercury as a result of piled-up magnetic flux that is draped around the magnetosphere. The low average upstream Alfvénic Mach number (MA ~3–5) in the solar wind at Mercury often results in large-scale plasma depletion in the magnetosheath between the subsolar magnetopause and the bow shock. Flux pileup is observed to occur downstream under both quasi-perpendicular and quasi-parallel shock geometries for all orientations of the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF). Furthermore, little to no plasma depletion is seen during some periods with stable northward IMF. The consistently low value of plasma β, the ratio of plasma pressure to magnetic pressure, at the magnetopause associated with the low average upstream MA is believed to be the cause for the high average reconnection rate at Mercury, reported to be nearly 3 times that observed at Earth. Finally, a characteristic depletion length outward from the subsolar magnetopause of ~300 km is found for Mercury. This value scales among planetary bodies as the average standoff distance of the magnetopause