Investigating Mercury's Magnetotail Twist at the Orbits of MPO and Mio
- 1European Space Agency, ESTEC SCI-EF, Leiden, Netherlands (willi.exner@esa.int)
- 2Institute for Geophysics and Extraterrestrial Physics, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany
- 3NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
- 4Department of Astronomy, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA
MESSENGER observations of Mercury's tail twist reveal a rather small twist of up to 3 degrees.
In this study, we model Mercury's magnetotail response to different Interplanetary Magnetic Field (IMF) directions and address what MPO and Mio might observe in their orbital phase.
Our hybrid model results indicate that Mercury's magnetotail topology exhibits a similar small twist at MPO altitudes, comparable to MESSENGER results.
In contrast, our results suggest that further downtail, Mio's tail twist observations are strongly dependent on the upstream magnetic field direction .
While the tail twist morphology appear to be mostly symmetric to each other, magnetospheric plasma exerts an additional influence on the current sheet that breaks some symmetries.
Using different analysis techniques, we estimate the degree of tail twisting predicted by these simulations.
How to cite: Exner, W. and Romanelli, N.: Investigating Mercury's Magnetotail Twist at the Orbits of MPO and Mio, Europlanet Science Congress 2024, Berlin, Germany, 8–13 Sep 2024, EPSC2024-184, https://doi.org/10.5194/epsc2024-184, 2024.
