M. O. Fillingim1, D. Chua2, G. A. Germany3, and J. F. Spann4
1Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley
2Space Science Division,
Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC
3Center for Space Plasma and Aeronomic Research,
University of Alabama in Huntsville
4NASA, Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, AL
Presented at the 2008 Joint Assembly, Fort Lauderdale, FL, 27 - 30 May 2008
Previously, Chua et al. [2004] computed substorm time scales for over three hundred substorms observed by the Polar Ultraviolet Imager (UVI). They found that statistically the substorm recovery time scales for substorms occurring near winter solstice and equinox (when the nighttime auroral zone was in darkness) was roughly twice as long as the recovery time scale for substorms occurring in the summer (when the nighttime auroral region was sunlit). These results strongly suggest that auroral substorms in the northern and southern hemispheres develop differently during solstice conditions with substorms lasting longer in the dark (winter) hemisphere than in the sunlit (summer) hemisphere. This also implies that more energy is deposited by electron precipitation in the winter hemisphere than in the summer one during substorms. Here, we extend this previous statistical work by analyzing the recovery time scales for simultaneous, conjugate auroral substorms observed by Polar UVI and IMAGE FUV. However, in order to quantitatively compare conjugate substorm time scales, we first inter-calibrate the two instruments by calculating the recovery time scales for both instruments while viewing "same scene" substorms to determine the effect of different temporal and spectral resolutions on the recovery time scales. We will discuss our inter-calibration procedure and present initial results of simultaneous, conjugate auroral substorm recovery time scales.
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Matt Fillingim
matt at ssl dot berkeley dot edu
University of California, Berkeley
Space Sciences Laboratory # 7450
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Berkeley, CA 94720-7450