Conclusion

Even though this study's design overemphasizes the importance of EMIC waves compared to BBELF waves in transverse acceleration of ions, we find no clear trend as to which mechanism is more important locally in determining He⁺ outflow, while the BBELF ion conics produce a larger outflow of H⁺ and O⁺, as well as a larger total ion outflow, than the EMIC ion conics. Furthermore, we find that, contrary to our expectations for a mass-selecting acceleration mechanism, the EMIC waves in these events are not correlated with enhanced He⁺ densities. Since we have found no preference for ion heating by EMIC waves in spite of this bias, we conclude that BBELF waves provide the most important mechanism for producing ion conics at auroral latitudes.


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Title Page | Abstract | Introduction | Data | Direct Comparison of Mechanisms | Conclusion | Acknowledgements | References