Conjugate and Same-Scene Auroral Imagery

J.F. Spann, G.K. Parks, S.B. Mende


Conjugate studies of high-latitude geomagnetic activity are central to
understanding the global magnetospheric response to external perturbations, i.e.
the solar wind, and the role of the ionosphere in modulating and coupling with
the magnetosphere. Interhemispheric asymmetries as manifested in auroral
emissions have been observed for over 40 years. Unfortunately, the nature of the
problem has limited the type and extent of studies that can be performed to
either conjugate ground based observations or comparison of space based images
with all-sky cameras. Recently Frank and Sigwarth (2002) published results using
unique simultaneous images from Polar of the northern and southern aurora, but
these are necessarily limited to the nighttime and at oblique angles. However,
images made with the cameras from the Polar and IMAGE missions contain
simultaneous conjugate images as well as same-scene images of the large-scale
aurora under many and varying conditions. This rich data set provides an
opportunity to study interhemispheric auroral asymmetries and investigate their
occurrence as a function of solar wind conditions and ionospheric parameters
such as conductivity. In order to use images of different scenes from each of
these cameras, knowledge of their relative response to a common scene is
required. To that end, this paper will present preliminary results of comparing
images with emphasis on data from the Polar UVI LBH filters and the IMAGE FUV
WIC.

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Presentation, Fall Meeting, American Geophysical Union, San Francisco, USA, 
8-12 December 2003