Tenuous Solar Winds: Lessons for Solar Wind-Magnetosphere Interactions

FARRUGIA, C. J.; JORDANOVA, V. K.; GRATTON, F. T.; OGILVIE, K.; MUEHLBACHLER, S.; TORBERT, R.

Varna, Bulgaria

Simposio; International Symposium on Recent Observations and Simulations of the Sun-Earth System (ISROSES); 2006

During the current solar cycle, there were a number of intervals of quasi-dropouts of the solar wind (desity < 1 /cc). These tenuous solar winds allow us to probe processes and properties of the magnetosphere and its coupling to the solar wind which would otherwise be masked by the effect of high density. In this presentation we shall focus on five areas where very interesting results were obtained and new insights gained: (i) the polar rain; (2) the magnetospheric magnetic configuration; (iii) dayside erosion; (iv) magnetosheath waves; and (v) ring current quiet time constants.