• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.62.3-63
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• 2017

The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile (MAVEN) mission has been providing valuable information on the atmospheric loss of Mars since its launch in November 2013. The Neutral Gass and Ion Mass Spectrometer (NGIMS) onboard MAVEN, was developed to analyze the composition of the Martian upper atmospheric neutrals and ions depending on various space weather conditions. We investigate a variation of upper atmospheric ion densities depending on the interplanetary coronal mass ejections (ICMEs). It is known that the Mars has a very weak global magnetic field, so upper atmosphere of Mars has been strongly affected by the solar activities. Meanwhile, a strong crustal magnetic field exists on local surfaces, so they also have a compensating effect on the upper atmospheric loss outside the Mars. The weak crustal field has an influence up to 200km altitude, but on a strong field region, especially east longitude of $180^{\circ}$ and latitude of $-50^{\circ}$, they have an influence over 1,400km altitude. In this paper, we investigated which is more dominant between the crustal field effect and the ICME effect to the atmospheric loss. At 400km altitude, the ion density over the strong crustal field region did not show a significant variation despite of ICME event. However, over the other areas, the variation associated with ICME event is far more overwhelming.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.35 no.2
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• pp.55-66
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• 2018

The solar magnetic field plays a central role in the field of solar research, both theoretically and practically. Sunspots are an important observational constraint since they are considered a discernable tracer of emerged magnetic flux tubes, providing the longest running records of solar magnetic activity. In this presentation, we first review the statistical properties of the latitudinal distribution of sunspots and discuss their implications. The phase difference between paired wings of the butterfly diagram has been revealed. Sunspots seem to emerge with the exponential distribution on top of slowly varying trends by periods of ~11 years, which is considered multiplicative rather than additive. We also present a concept for the center-of-latitude (COL) and its use. With this, one may sort out a traditional butterfly diagram and find new features. It is found that the centroid of the COL does not migrate monotonically toward the equator, appearing to form an 'active latitude'. Furthermore, distributions of the COL as a function of latitude depend on solar activity and the solar North-South asymmetry. We believe that these findings serve as crucial diagnostic tools for any potential model of the solar dynamo. Finally, we find that as the Sun modulates the amount of observed galactic cosmic ray influx, the solar North-South asymmetry seems to contribute to the relationship between the solar variability and terrestrial climate change.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.35 no.1
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• pp.27.1-27.1
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• 2010

We examined variations of the solar wind magnetic fields which are characterized by smooth field rotations with time scales of 2-7 hours, and identified the existence of two classes of structures. One is a small-scale magnetic flux rope, and the other shows clear characteristics of Alfven waves. In this study, we attempted to clarify fundamental characteristics of the structure of the second class. We have found that the observed features are basically described by the cylindrical structure consisting of the uniform background field and the circular torsional wave field propagating along the background field. We performed the least-squares fitting analysis for the observed rotational variations with a simple model of the torsional Alfven wave as described above. The fitted results show satisfactory agreement with observations and thus allow us to determine the structure of the region occupied by the torsional Alfven wave. Furthermore, the examination of ACE and WIND observations reveals several cases in which two spacecrafts encountered the same structure at different position and different times. Comparison of such cases provides further evidence that the observed rotational field variations are due to the torsional Alfven waves, and not due to elliptically-polarized Alfven waves.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.43 no.2
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• pp.58.2-58.2
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• 2018

Theoretically, the magnetic helicity transport flux through the solar surface into the upper atmosphere can be estimated indefinitely precisely by magnetic field footpoint tracking if the observational resolution is infinitely fine, even with magnetic flux emergence or submergence. In reality, the temporal and spatial resolutions of observations are limited. When magnetic flux emerging or submerging, the footpoint velocity goes to infinity and the normal magnetic field vanishes at the polarity inversion line. A finite observational resolution thus generates a blackout area in helicity flux estimation near the polarity inversion line. It is questioned how much magnetic helicity is underestimated with a footpoint tracking method due to the absence of information in the blackout area. We adopt the analytical models of Gold-Hoyle and Lundquist force-free flux ropes and let them emerging from below the solar surface. The observation and the helicity integration can start at different emerging stages of the flux rope, i.e., the photospheric plane initially cuts the flux rope at different levels. We calculate the magnetic helicity of the flux rope below the photospheric level, which is eventually to emerge, except the helicity hidden in the region to be swept by the blackout area with different widths. Our calculation suggests that the error in the integrated helicity flux estimate is about half of the real value or even larger when small scale magnetic structures emerge into the solar atmosphere.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.375-382
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• 2008

On August 31, 2001, ${\sim}$ 1705 - 1718 UT, Cluster was located near the midnight magnetotail, GSE (x, y, z) ${\sim}$ (-19, - 2,2) RE, and observed fast earthward flow bursts in the vicinity of the neutral sheet. They occurred while the tail magnetic field suddenly increased. Using simultaneous measurements in the solar wind, at geosynchronous orbit, and on the ground, it is confirmed that tail magnetic field enhancement is due to an increased solar wind pressure. In the neutral sheet region, strongly enhanced earthward flow bursts perpendicular to the local magnetic field $(V_{{\perp}x})$ were observed. Auroral brightenings localized in the pre-midnight sector (${\sim}$ 2200 - 2400 MLT) occurred during the interval of the $V_{{\perp}x}$ enhancements. The $V_{{\perp}x}$ bursts started ${\sim}$ 2 minutes before the onset of auroral brightenings. Our observations suggest that the earthward flow bursts are associated with tail reconnection directly driven by a solar wind pressure impulse and that $V_{{\perp}x}$ caused localized auroral brightenings.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.77-84
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• 2020

We performed high-resolution three-dimensional global magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations to study the interaction between the Earth's magnetosphere and a prolonged steady southward interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) (Bz = -2nT) and slow solar wind. The simulation results show that dayside magnetic reconnection continuously occurs at the subsolar region where the magnetosheath magnetic field is antiparallel to the geomagnetic field. The plasmoid developed on closed plasma sheet field lines. We found that the vortex was generated at the magnetic equator such as (X, Y) = (7.6, 8.9) R_E due to the viscous-like interaction, which was strengthened by dayside reconnection. The magnetic field and plasma properties clearly showed quasiperiodic variations with a period of 8-10 min across the vortex. Additionally, double twin parallel vorticity in the polar region was clearly seen. The peak value of the cross-polar cap potential fluctuated between 17 and 20 kV during the tail reconnection.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.137-147
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• 1999

Recent studies show the importance of understanding three-dimensional magnetic reconnect ion on the solar surface. For this purpose, I consider non-coplanar magnetic reconnection, a simple case of three-dimensional reconnect ion driven by a collision of two straight flux tubes which are not on the same plane initially. The relative angle e between the two tubes characterizes such reconnection, and can be regarded as a measure of magnetic shear. The observable characteristics of non-coplanar reconnection are compared between the two cases of small and large angles. An important feature of the non-coplanar reconnect ion is that magnetic twist can be produced via the re-ordering of field lines. This is a consequence of the conversion of mutual helicity into self helicities by reconnection. It is shown that the principle of energy conservation when combined with the production of magnetic twist puts a low limit on the relative angle between two flux tubes for reconnect ion to occur. I provide several observations supporting the magnetic twist generation by reconnection, and discuss its physical implications for the origin of magnetic twist on the solar surface and the problem of coronal heating.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.29 no.spc1
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• pp.303-305
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• 1996

The evolution of solar magnetic arcades is investigated with the use of MHD simulations imposing resistivity on sheared magnetic fields. It is found that there is a critical amount of shear, over which magnetic reconnection can take place ill an arcade-like field geometry to create a magnetic island. The process leading to reconnect ion cannot. be solely attributed to a tearing instability, but rather to a reactive evolution of the magnetic arcade under resistivity. The natures of the arcade reconnection are governed by the spatial pattern of resistivity. A fast reconnection with a small shock angle can only be achieved when the diffusion region is localized. In this case. a highly collimated reconnect ion outflow can tear the plasmoid into a pair, and most of principal features in solar eruptive processes are reproduced.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.49 no.2
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• pp.59-64
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• 2016

In this study, we investigate the kinetic properties of magnetic decreases observed in the solar wind at ~1 AU using the Cluster observations. We study two different magnetic decreases: one with a short observation duration of ~2.5 minutes and stable structure and the other with a longer observation duration of ~40 minutes and some fluctuations and substructures. Despite the contrast in durations and magnetic structures, the velocity space distributions of ions are similar in both events. The velocity space distribution becomes more anisotropic along the direction parallel to the magnetic field, which differs from observations obtained at high heliographic latitudes. On the other hand, electrons show different features from the ions. The core component of the electrons shows similar anisotropy to the ions, though the anisotropy is much weaker. However, while ions are heated in the magnetic decreases, the core electrons are slightly cooled, especially in the perpendicular direction. The halo component does not change much in the magnetic decreases from the ambient solar wind. The strahl component is observed only in one of the magnetic decreases. The results imply that the ions and electrons in the magnetic decreases can behave differently, which should be considered for the formation mechanism of the magnetic decreases.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.26.2-26.2
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• 2009