Solar wind plasma transfer to plasma sheet
Date: 28 April 2005
Satellite: Cluster
Depicts: Animated simulation of plasma transfer to plasma sheet
This animation is directly derived from the simulation. It shows colour coded the plasma density both in the equatorial plane, and in a plane that cuts through the Cluster location at x=-12 RE.
The blue tube and the little blue ball on it trace a plasma parcel as it moves from the solar wind to the location in the tail where Cluster eventually observes it. Attached to the ball is also a field line of the interplanetary magnetic field that moves along with it. This field line initially is not connected to the Earth. It eventually reconnects with Earth's field first in the northern hemisphere (its color changes from yellow to orange), and then in the southern hemisphere (color changes from orange to red).
This magnetic field reconnection is the process by which plasma from the solar wind is captured and brought into the magnetosphere.