• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.303-309
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• 2014

The Earth's outer radiation belt often suffers from drastic changes in the electron fluxes. Since the electrons can be a potential threat to satellites, efforts have long been made to model and predict electron flux variations. In this paper, we describe a prediction model for the outer belt electrons that we have recently developed at Chungbuk National University. The model is based on a one-dimensional radial diffusion equation with observationally determined specifications of a few major ingredients in the following way. First, the boundary condition of the outer edge of the outer belt is specified by empirical functions that we determine using the THEMIS satellite observations of energetic electrons near the boundary. Second, the plasmapause locations are specified by empirical functions that we determine using the electron density data of THEMIS. Third, the model incorporates the local acceleration effect by chorus waves into the one-dimensional radial diffusion equation. We determine this chorus acceleration effect by first obtaining an empirical formula of chorus intensity as a function of drift shell parameter $L^*$, incorporating it as a source term in the one-dimensional diffusion equation, and lastly calibrating the term to best agree with observations of a certain interval. We present a comparison of the model run results with and without the chorus acceleration effect, demonstrating that the chorus effect has been incorporated into the model to a reasonable degree.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.145-158
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• 2022

The dynamics of the outer zone radiation belt has received a lot of attention mainly due to the correlation between the occurrence of enhancing relativistic electron flux and spacecraft operation anomalies or even failures (e.g., Baker et al. 1994). Relativistic electron events are often observed during great storms associated with ultra low frequency (ULF) waves. For example, a large buildup of relativistic electrons was observed during the great storm of March 24, 1991 (e.g., Li et al. 1993; Hudson et al. 1995; Mann et al. 2013). However, the dominant processes which accelerate magnetospheric radiation belt electrons to MeV energies are not well understood. In this paper, we present observations of Pc5 ULF waves in the recovery phase of the Bastille day storm of July 16, 2000 and electron and proton flux simultaneously oscillating with the same frequencies as the waves. The mechanism for the observed electron and proton flux modulations is examined using ground-based and satellite observations. During this storm time, multiple packets of discrete frequency Pc5 ULF waves appeared associated with energetic particle flux oscillations. We model the drift paths of electrons and protons to determine if the particles drift through the ULF wave to understand why some particle fluxes are modulated by the ULF waves and others are not. We also analyze the flux oscillations of electrons and protons as a function of energy to determine if the particle modulations are caused by a ULF wave drift resonance or advection of a particle density gradient. We suggest that the energetic electron and proton modulations by Pc5 ULF waves provide further evidence in support of the important role that ULF waves play in outer radiation belt dyanamics during storm times.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.36 no.2
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• pp.45-60
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• 2019

The Earth's outer radiation belt has long received considerable attention mainly because the MeV electron flux in the belt varies often dramatically and at various time scales. It is now widely accepted that the wave-particle interaction is one of the major mechanisms responsible for such flux variations. The wave-particle interaction can accelerate electrons to MeV energies, explaining the observed flux increase events, and can also scatter the electrons' motion into the loss cone, resulting in atmospheric precipitation and thus contributing to flux dropouts. In this paper, we provide a review of the current state of research on relativistic electron scattering and precipitation due to the interaction with electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves in the inner magnetosphere. The review is intended to cover progress made over the last ~15 years in the theory and simulations of various issues, including quasilinear resonance diffusion, nonlinear interactions, nonresonant interactions, effects of finite normal angle on pitch angle scattering, effects due to rising tone emission, and ways to scatter near-equatorial pitch angle electrons. The review concludes with suggestions of a few promising topics for future research.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.42.2-43
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• 2016

Electrostatic fluctuations near upper-hybrid frequency, which are sometimes accompanied by multiple-harmonic electron cyclotron frequency bands above and below the upper-hybrid frequency, are common occurrences in the Earth's radiation belt, as revealed through the twin Van Allen Probe spacecraft. In the literature upper-hybrid emissions are used for estimating the background electron density, which in turn can be used to determine the plasmapause locations, but the role of energetic electrons in generating such fluctuations has not been discussed. The present paper carries out detailed analyses of data from the Waves instrument, which is part of the Electric and Magnetic Field Instrument Suite and Integrated Science (EMFISIS) suite onboard the Van Allen Probes. Combined with theoretical calculation, it is demonstrated that the peak intensity associated with the upper-hybrid fluctuations is predominantly determined by tenuous but energetic electrons, and that denser and less energetic background electrons do not contribute much to the peak intensity. This finding shows that upper-hybrid fluctuations detected during quiet time are useful not only for the determination of the electron density, but also they contain information on the ambient energetic electron population as well.

• Bulletin of the Korean Space Science Society
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• 2009.10a
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• pp.32.2-32.2
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• 2009

We examine cyclotron resonant interactions of radiation belt electrons with VLF chorus, plasmaspheric ELF hiss and electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves. Bounce-averaged diffusion rates depend on wave mode, equatorial pitch-angle, electron energy and L-shell. As well, diffusion rates can be sensitive to the latitudinal distributions of particle density and wave power. For different configurations of the plasmasphere, we calculate electron precipitation loss timescales due to combined scattering by VLF chorus, ELF hiss and EMIC waves.

• Bulletin of the Korean Space Science Society
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• 2000.04a
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• pp.17-17
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• 2000

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• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.90.1-90.1
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• 2012

Understanding the dynamics of relativistic electron acceleration, loss, and transport in the Earth's radiation belt during magnetic storms is a challenging task. The U.S. National Science Foundation's Geospace Environment Modeling (GEM) has identified five magnetic storms for in-depth study that occurred during the second half of the Combined Release and Radiation Effects Satellite (CRRES) mission in the year 1991. In this study, we show the responses of relativistic radiation belt electrons to the magnetic storms by comparing the time-dependent 3-D Versatile Electron Radiation Belt (VERB) simulations with the CRRES MEA 1 MeV electron observations in order to investigate the relative roles of the competing effects of previously proposed scattering mechanisms at different storm phases, as well as to examine the extent to which the simulations can reproduce observations. The major scattering processes in our model are radial transport due to Ultra Low Frequency (ULF) electromagnetic fluctuations, pitch-angle and energy diffusion including mixed diffusion by whistler mode chorus waves outside the plasmasphere, and pitch-angle scattering by plasmaspheric hiss inside the plasmasphere. We provide a detailed description of simulations for each of the GEM storm events.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.31-38
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• 2021

In this paper, we present observations of the Space Radiation Detectors (SRDs) onboard the Next Generation Small Satellite-1 (NEXTSat-1) satellite. The SRDs, which are a part of the Instruments for the study of Stable/Storm-time Space (ISSS), consist of the Medium-Energy Particle Detector (MEPD) and the High-Energy Particle Detector (HEPD). The MEPD can detect electrons, ions, and neutrals with energies ranging from 20 to 400 keV, and the HEPD can detect electrons over an energy range from 0.35 to 2 MeV. In this paper, we report an event where particle flux enhancements due to substorm injections are clearly identified in the MEPD A observations at energies of tens of keV. Additionally, we report a specific example observation of the electron distributions over a wide energy range in which we identify electron spatial distributions with energies of tens to hundreds of keV from the MEPD and with energy ranging up to a few MeV from the HEPD in the slot region and outer radiation belts. In addition, for an ~1.5-year period, we confirm that the HEPD successfully observed the well-known outer radiation belt electron flux distributions and their variations in time and L shell in a way consistent with the geomagnetic disturbance levels. Last, we find that the inner edge of the outer radiation belt is mostly coincident with the plasmapause locations in L, somewhat more consistent at subrelativistic energies than at relativistic energies. Based on these example events, we conclude that the SRD observations are of reliable quality, so they are useful for understanding the dynamics of the inner magnetosphere, including substorms and radiation belt variations.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.95.1-95.1
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• 2013

The RBSPICE (Radiation Belt Storm Probes Ion Composition Experiment) is one of five instrument suites onboard the twin Van Allan Probes (or Radiation Belt Storm Probes; RBSP), launched August 30, 2012 by NASA. One of science targets of RBSPICE instrument is to determine "how changes in that ring current affect the creation, acceleration, and loss of radiation belt particles?". For that purpose, it measures ions and electrons simultaneously. Ion's energy range is from ~20 keV to ~1 MeV and electron's energy channel is from ~35 keV to 1 MeV in order to provide supplementary information about the radiation belts. In this paper, we investigate a reliability of the electron flux measured from the RBSPICE by comparing with ECT (The Energetic Particle, Composition and Thermal Plasma Suite) data. We found there is a critical proton contamination problem in the electron channels of ~ 1MeV of RBSPICE observations during one moderate storm event of Sym H ~ -76 nT on March 1, 2013.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.295-301
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• 2014

Whistler mode chorus wave is considered to play a critical role in accelerating and precipitating the electrons in the outer radiation belt. In this paper we test a conventional scenario of triggering chorus using THEMIS satellite observations of waves and particles. Specifically, we test if the chorus onset is consistent with development of anisotropy in the electron phase space density (PSD). After analyzing electron PSD for 73 chorus events, we find that, for ~80 % of them, their onsets are indeed associated with development of the positive anisotropy in PSD where the pitch angle distribution of electron velocity peaks at 90 degrees. This PSD anisotropy is prominent mainly at the electron energy range of ${\leq}$ ~20 keV. Interestingly, we further find that there is sometimes a time delay among energies in the increases of the anisotropy: A development of the positive anisotropy occurs earlier by several minutes for lower energy than for an adjacent higher energy.