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The Atmosphere Explorer magnetometer experiment
Author(s) -
Armstrong James C.,
Zmuda A. J.
Publication year - 1973
Publication title -
radio science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.371
H-Index - 84
eISSN - 1944-799X
pISSN - 0048-6604
DOI - 10.1029/rs008i004p00401
Subject(s) - magnetometer , ionosphere , physics , electrojet , earth's magnetic field , solar wind , spacecraft , atmosphere (unit) , geophysics , magnetosphere , magnetic field , computational physics , geodesy , remote sensing , meteorology , geology , astronomy , quantum mechanics
A three‐axis fluxgate magnetometer/analog‐to‐digital converter system will be included in the Atmosphere Explorer‐D and ‐E payloads. The scientific function of this system (the magnetometer experiment) is to measure magnetic fields due to field‐aligned and ionospheric currents, particularly in the auroral region. These currents relate to the magnetosphere‐ionosphere and solar wind‐ionosphere coupling and represent a considerable source of energy input into the auroral ionosphere. Attempts will also be made to measure the magnetic fields of the equatorial electrojet and other ionospheric current systems, although stray spacecraft fields might preclude these measurements. Each magnetometer axis will be sampled ≈ 8 times per second to a resolution of at least 5 γ (1 γ = 10 −9 Wb m −2 ). For this experiment, good resolution (≈ 0.007% of the maximum magnetic field to be encountered) and a high sampling rate are much more important than absolute accuracy of the measurements, since systematic errors in absolute accuracy simply shift an already arbitrary baseline level.