This project is a three-way collaboration between PIs at Dartmouth, Embry-Riddle and Siena College. In a previous grant the team examined LF, MF, and HF radio emissions at several high latitude observatories. The instrumentation utilized interferometry to provide direction finding information in order to locate the source region of the observed emissions. This proposal will use the existing radio interferometers and spectrum analyzers in conjunction with riometers, magnetometers, all-sky cameras, photometers, ISR and SuperDARN radars to investigate the relationship of the radio emissions to substorms and to energetic particle precipitation. The project will concentrate on the least well understood form of auroral emission, what is known as an MF-burst. There are two primary goals: (1) to determine the generation mechanism of MF-bursts and (2) to determine the relationship of the MF-bursts to auroral acceleration processes and substorm phenomena.
The project includes research opportunities for both graduate and undergraduate students. The data will be made publicly available and is likely to be useful to researchers involved with the Canadian e-Pop satellite mission and the NASA THEMIS mission.
