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    Estimates of Ionospheric Transport and Ion Loss at Mars

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    Cravens_Oct_ 2017.pdf (969.9Kb)
    Issue Date
    2017-09-29
    Author
    Cravens, Thomas Edward
    Hamil, O.
    Houston, S.
    Bougher, Stephen W.
    Ma, Y.
    Ledvina, S.
    Publisher
    American Geophysical Union
    Type
    Article
    Article Version
    Scholarly/refereed, publisher version
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    Abstract
    Ion loss from the topside ionosphere of Mars associated with the solar wind interaction makes an important contribution to the loss of volatiles from this planet. Data from NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission combined with theoretical modeling are now helping us to understand the processes involved in the ion loss process. Given the complexity of the solar wind interaction, motivation exists for considering a simple approach to this problem and for understanding how the loss rates might scale with solar wind conditions and solar extreme ultraviolet irradiance. This paper reviews the processes involved in the ionospheric dynamics. Simple analytical and semiempirical expressions for ion flow speeds and ion loss are derived. In agreement with more sophisticated models and with purely empirical studies, it is found that the oxygen loss rate from ion transport is about 5% (i.e., global O ion loss rate of Qion ≈ 4 × 1024 s−1) of the total oxygen loss rate. The ion loss is found to approximately scale as the square root of the solar ionizing photon flux and also as the square root of the solar wind dynamic pressure. Typical ion flow speeds are found to be about 1 km/s in the topside ionosphere near an altitude of 300 km on the dayside. Not surprisingly, the plasma flow speed is found to increase with altitude due to the decreasing ion‐neutral collision frequency.
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/1808/27120
    DOI
    https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JA024582
    Collections
    • Physics and Astronomy Scholarly Works [1636]
    Citation
    Cravens, T. E., Hamil, O., Houston, S., Bougher, S., Ma, Y., Brain, D. & Ledvina, S. (2017). Estimates of ionospheric transport and ion loss at Mars. Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 122, 10,626–10,637. https://doi.org/10.1002/2017JA024582

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    Lawrence, KS 66045
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    Contact KU ScholarWorks
    785-864-8983
    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    785-864-8983

    KU Libraries
    1425 Jayhawk Blvd
    Lawrence, KS 66045
    Image Credits
     

     

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