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Accurately characterizing the importance of wave‐particle interactions in radiation belt dynamics: The pitfalls of statistical wave representations
Author(s) -
Murphy Kyle R.,
Mann Ian R.,
Rae I. Jonathan,
Sibeck David G.,
Watt Clare E. J.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: space physics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2169-9402
pISSN - 2169-9380
DOI - 10.1002/2016ja022618
Subject(s) - geomagnetic storm , van allen radiation belt , wave–particle duality , storm , wave power , proxy (statistics) , geophysics , earth's magnetic field , meteorology , radiation , physics , atmospheric sciences , particle dynamics , climatology , geology , environmental science , computational physics , power (physics) , magnetosphere , mathematics , statistics , optics , magnetic field , quantum mechanics , plasma
Wave‐particle interactions play a crucial role in energetic particle dynamics in the Earth's radiation belts. However, the relative importance of different wave modes in these dynamics is poorly understood. Typically, this is assessed during geomagnetic storms using statistically averaged empirical wave models as a function of geomagnetic activity in advanced radiation belt simulations. However, statistical averages poorly characterize extreme events such as geomagnetic storms in that storm‐time ultralow frequency wave power is typically larger than that derived over a solar cycle and Kp is a poor proxy for storm‐time wave power.