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Source location of the narrowbanded radio bursts at Uranus: Evidence of a cusp source
Author(s) -
Farrell W. M.,
Desch M. D.,
Kaiser M. L.,
Kurth W. S.
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
geophysical research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.007
H-Index - 273
eISSN - 1944-8007
pISSN - 0094-8276
DOI - 10.1029/gl017i003p00295
Subject(s) - uranus , physics , cusp (singularity) , astrophysics , astronomy , magnetic field , spacecraft , polar , solar wind , plasma , radio wave , geophysics , planet , geometry , mathematics , quantum mechanics
While Voyager 2 was inbound to Uranus, radio bursts of narrow bandwidth (< 5 kHz) were detected between 17–116 kHz by both the Planetary Radio Astronomy (PRA) and Plasma Wave (PWS) experiments. These R‐X mode bursts, designated n‐bursts, were of short duration (about 250 msec), tended to occur when the north magnetic pole tipped toward the spacecraft, and increased in occurrence with increasing solar wind density. In this report, we present an explicit determination of the burst source location based upon fitting the region of detection at high and low frequencies to field‐aligned, symmetric cones. The region of good fits was located between the north magnetic pole and the rotational pole, corresponding approximately to the northern polar cusp. Based upon the emission power, it is suspected that at certain times large amounts of auroral input power may originate in this cusp.