Numerical Investigations of Interhemispheric Asymmetry due to
Ionospheric Conductance
Abstract
Due to differences in solar illumination, a geomagnetic field line may
have one footpoint in a dark ionosphere while the other ionosphere is in
daylight. This may happen near the terminator under solstice conditions.
In this situation, a resonant wave mode may appear which has a node in
the electric field in the sunlit (high conductance) ionosphere and an
antinode in the dark (low conductance) ionosphere. Thus, the length of
the field line is one quarter of the wavelength of the wave, in contrast
with half-wave field line resonances in which both ionospheres are nodes
in the electric field. These quarter waves have resonant frequencies
that are roughly a factor of 2 lower than the half-wave frequency on the
field line. We have simulated these resonances using a fully
three-dimensional model of ULF waves in a dipolar magnetosphere. The
ionospheric conductance is modeled as a function of the solar zenith
angle, and so this model can describe the change in the wave resonance
frequency as the ground magnetometer station varies in local time. The
results show that the quarter-wave resonances can be excited by a
shock-like impulse at the dayside magnetosphere and exhibit many of the
properties of the observed waves. In particular, the simulations support
the notion that a conductance ratio between day and night footpoints of
the field line must be greater than about 5 for the quarter waves to
exist.