Harris, Camilla DK;
Jia, Xianzhe;
Slavin, James A;
(2022)
Multi-Fluid MHD Simulations of Europa's Plasma Interaction: Effects of Variation in Europa's Atmosphere.
Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics
, 127
(9)
, Article e2022JA030569. 10.1029/2022JA030569.
Preview |
Text
Multi-Fluid MHD Simulations of Europas Plasma Interaction Effects of Variation in Europas Atmosphere.pdf - Published Version Download (3MB) | Preview |
Abstract
Europa's plasma interaction is inextricably coupled to its O2 atmosphere by the chemical processes that generate plasma from the atmosphere and the sputtering of magnetospheric plasma against Europa's ice to generate O2. Observations of Europa's atmosphere admit a range of possible densities and spatial distributions (Hall et al., 1998, https://doi.org/10.1086/305604). To better understand this system, we must characterize how different possible configurations of the atmosphere affect the 3D magnetic fields and bulk plasma properties near Europa. To accomplish this, we conducted a parameter study using a multi-fluid magnetohydrodynamic model for Europa's plasma interaction (Harris et al., 2021, https://doi.org/10.1029/2020ja028888). We varied parameters of Europa's atmosphere, as well as the conditions of Jupiter's magnetosphere, over 18 simulations. As the scale height and density of Europa's atmosphere increase, the extent and density of the ionosphere increase as well, generating strong magnetic fields that shield Europa's surface from impinging plasma on the trailing hemisphere. We also calculate the precipitation rate of magnetospheric plasma onto Europa's surface. As the O2 column density increased from (1–2.5) × 1014 cm−2, the precipitation rate decreased sharply then leveled off at 2 × 1024 ions/s for simulations with low magnetospheric plasma density and 6.4 × 1024 ions/s for simulations with high magnetospheric plasma density. These results indicate that the coupling between Europa's plasma populations and its atmosphere leads to feedback that limits increases in the ionosphere density.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Multi-Fluid MHD Simulations of Europa's Plasma Interaction: Effects of Variation in Europa's Atmosphere |
| Location: | United States |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1029/2022JA030569 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1029/2022ja030569 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2022. The Authors. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Keywords: | Europa, multi-fluid magnetohydrodynamics, Moon-magnetosphere interactions |
| UCL classification: | UCL |
| URI: | https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10204000 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
