a Department of Physics, University of Texas at El Paso, El Paso, TX 79968, USA
b Department of Physics and Astronomy, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH 03755, USA
c Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Abstract:
Global MHD models hold the promise of providing a physics-based understanding of magnetospheric structure and dynamics. As such models have become more sophisticated, and computing power has increased, it is now possible to model actual events using solar wind data as a boundary condition. In this paper we present some results MHD simulations of actual storm and substorm events. We will demonstrate that not only can the simulations reproduce details of events, they also are reproducing fundamental aspects of energy coupling between the solar wind and the magnetosphere in such a manner that we can distinguish storms and substorms.