Comparative Study of Planetary Magnetospheres

本项目旨在对木星、土星、天王星和可能的海王星等外行星的对流等离子体输运和电离层-磁层耦合进行理论研究。木星和土星的磁层是由嵌入卫星的内部等离子体源驱动的。行星自转产生的能量起着重要的作用。天王星的磁层是由太阳风驱动的，就像我们熟悉的地球磁层一样。然而，行星自转仍然非常重要。在所有这些磁层中，对流是由与电离层的电动力学耦合调节的。为了研究这些过程，将使用数值模拟。为了指导建模工作，将使用旅行者号等离子体和磁场实验的观测结果。对各种行星磁层的比较研究将增强我们对地球磁层-电离层耦合过程的认识。

This project is for the theoretical investigation of convective plasma transport and ionosphere-magnetosphere coupling in the outer planets Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and possible Neptune. The magnetospheres of Jupiter and Saturn are driven by internal sources of plasma from embedded satellites. The energy from the planetary rotation plays an important role. The magnetosphere of Uranus is driven by the solar wind, a familiar situation like the terrestrial magnetosphere. However, the planetary rotation is still very important. In all of these magnetospheres, convection is regulated by electrodynamic coupling to the ionosphere. In order to investigate these processes, numerical modeling will be used. To guide the modeling effort, the observations from the Voyager experiments of plasma and magnetic field will be used. The comparative study of the various planetary magnetospheres will enhance our understanding of terrestrial magnetosphere-ionosphere coupling processes.