Earth's Magnetosphere: Formed by the Low-Latitude Boundary Layer

Front Cover
Elsevier, Oct 13, 2011 - Science - 477 pages

The author argues that, after five decades of debate about the interactive of solar wind with the magnetosphere, it is time to get back to basics. Starting with Newton's law, this book also examines Maxwell's equations and subsidiary equations such as continuity, constitutive relations and the Lorentz transformation; Helmholtz' theorem, and Poynting's theorem, among other methods for understanding this interaction.



  • Includes chapters on prompt particle acceleration to high energies, plasma transfer event, and the low latitude boundary layer
  • More than 200 figures illustrate the text
  • Includes a color insert
 

Contents

Chapter 1 Historical introduction
1
Chapter 2 Approximate methods
75
Chapter 3 Helmholtzs theorem
111
Chapter 4 Poyntings energy conservation theorem
151
Chapter 5 Magnetopause
171
Chapter 6 Highaltitude cusps
225
Chapter 7 Lowlatitude boundary layer
253
Chapter 8 Driving the plasma sheet
325
Chapter 9 Magnetospheric substorms
377
What is new in this book
435
References
447
Index
473
Color Plates
479
Copyright

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About the author (2011)

Walter Heikkila is Professor Emeritus in the Physics Department at the University of Texas at Dallas. His research interests include space physics and solar physics, specifically magnetospheric physics, solar wind, and auroral substorms. He received his PhD in Low Temperature Physics from the University of Toronto. He has since worked for the Defence Research Telecommunications Establishment, before becoming Associate Professor of Physics at the Southwest Center for Advanced Studies and subsequently Professor of Physics at University of Texas at Dallas. He is the author of the first edition of Earth's Magnetosphere and a leading expert on the Earth's magnetic field.

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