This grant supports an investigation of the solar wind with the terrestrial magnetosphere using ground-based magnetic records from the turn of the century to the present in conjunction with interplanetary measurements when available. This study will examine the control by the interplanetary magnetic field of geomagnetic activity, the response of the magnetosphere to the blockage of the solar wind by comet Halley in 1910; the response of the magnetosphere to rapid reductions of the momentum flux in the solar wind, the deceleration of interplanetary shocks near 1 AU, the statistical properties of geomagnetic storms and the quantification of substorm magnitudes. The study will employ the collections of the World Data Center A including those on their newly produce CDROM and the data collected during the International Magnetospheric Study (IMS). In addition to aiding our understanding of the coupling of the solar wind and the Earth's magnetosphere, and its variation over the last century, this study will help test the accuracy of the CDROM and IMS data sets and aid in the correction of those data.
