Ion Acoustic Waves in the Heliosphere

Observations of ion acoustic waves in the solar wind during the first and second orbit of the Ulysses spacecraft are presented. The observations show variations of the wave activity with the heliolatitude and with the phase of the solar cycle. The interrelationships between the wave intensity and the electron heat flux and the ratio of electron to proton temperature, T _e/T _p, are examined. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

The FAST Satellite Fields Instrument

We describe the electric field sensors and electric and magnetic field signal processing on the FAST (Fast Auroral SnapshoT) satellite. The FAST satellite was designed to make high time resolution observations of particles and electromagnetic fields in the auroral zone to study small-scale plasma interactions in the auroral acceleration region. The DC and AC electric fields are measured with three-axis dipole antennas with 56 m, 8 m, and 5 m baselines. A three-axis flux-gate magnetometer measures the DC magnetic field and a three-axis search coil measures the AC magnetic field. A central signal processing system receives all signals from the electric and magnetic field sensors. Spectral coverage is from DC to 4 MHz. There are several types of processed data. Survey data are continuous over the auroral zone and have full-orbit coverage for fluxgate magnetometer data. Burst data include a few minutes of a selected region of the auroral zone at the highest time resolution. A subset of the burst data, high speed burst memory data, are waveform data at 2×10⁶ sample s^–1. Electric field and magnetic field data are primarily waveforms and power spectral density as a function of frequency and time. There are also various types of focused data processing, including cross-spectral analysis, fine-frequency plasma wave tracking, high-frequency polarity measurement, and wave-particle correlations.     

Ring Currents and Internal Plasma Sources

The discovery of terrestrial O⁺ and other heavy ions in magnetospheric hot plasmas, combined with the association of energetic ionospheric outflows with geomagnetic activity, led to the conclusion that increasing geomagnetic activity is responsible for filling the magnetosphere with ionospheric plasma. Recently it has been discovered that a major source of ionospheric heavy ion plasma outflow is responsive to the earliest impact of coronal mass ejecta upon the dayside ionosphere. Thus a large increase in ionospheric outflows begins promptly during the initial phase of geomagnetic storms, and is already present during the main phase development of such storms. We hypothesize that enhancement of the internal source of plasma actually supports the transition from substorm enhancements of aurora to storm-time ring current development in the inner magnetosphere. Other planets known to have ring current-like plasmas also have substantial internal sources of plasma, notably Jupiter and Saturn. One planet having a small magnetosphere, but very little internal source of plasma, is Mercury. Observations suggest that Mercury has substorms, but are ambiguous with regard to the possibility of magnetic storms of the planet. The Messenger mission to Mercury should provide an interesting test of our hypothesis. Mercury should support at most a modest ring current if its internal plasma source is as small as is currently believed. If substantiated, this hypothesis would support a general conclusion that the magnetospheric inflationary response is a characteristic of magnetospheres with substantial internal plasma sources. We quantitatively define this hypothesis and pose it as a problem in comparative magnetospheres.     

气固紊流剪切流中颗粒弥散的拉格朗日模拟

本文提出了一种对于气固两相紊流剪切流中圆形固体颗粒弥散的拉格朗日拟计算方法，其中考虑了颗粒间的磁撞对流体相和颗料相的影响，应用该方法对一气固紊流剪切流场进行了模拟计算，并对有、无颗粒间磁撞情况下的模拟计算结果与Lavieville用大涡模拟方法的研究结果进行了比较，并进行了讨论。     

Radio observations of Venus and the interpretations

The radio observations of Venus are reviewed and compared with theoretical microwave spectra computed for a variety of models of the Venusian environment. The models considered are (a) a CO₂-N₂ atmosphere, (b) an atmosphere of dust (the aeolosphere model), and (c) a cloud model with various loss mechanisms in the cloud. The effect of polarization on the surface emissivity has been included in all the computations. It is shown how the radio observations place limits upon the acceptable models, for example, the density and size of dust particles required in the aeolosphere model. It is shown how some models place severe restrictions on radar observations at short centimeter wavelengths, thereby emphasizing the importance of such experiments. These same models show that the Mariner II observations can not be interpreted in terms of surface phenomena and provide a new interpretation for the microwave phase effect.This work was supported in part by the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force under Contract DA36-039-AMC-03200(E); and in part by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Grants NsG-250-62 and NsG-419).     

Resonant Cavity Measurements of Ionized Wakes

A transmission resonant cavity technique, which is suitable for making measurements of electron line densities and collision frequencies in the ionized wakes of hypervelocity projectiles, is described. With this method electron density measurements can be made over six orders of magnitude. Resonant cavity design requirements and limitations of the method are discussed. Typical data from measurements behind projectiles traveling at speeds up to 6.5 km/s are given.