Structure of the current sheets in the near-Mars magnetotail. Maven observations

During the last 15 years, the Current Sheets (CSs) have been intensively studied in the tail of the terrestrial magnetosphere, where protons are the dominated ion component. On the contrary, in the Martian magnetotail heavy ions (O⁺ and⁺ ₀) usually dominate while the abundance of protons can be negligible. Hence it is interesting to study the spatial structure and plasma characteristics of such “oxygen” CSs. MAVEN spacecraft (s/c) currently operating on the Martian orbit with a unique set of scientific instruments allows observation of the magnetic field and three-dimensional distribution functions of various ion components and electrons with a high time resolution. In this paper, we analyse nine intervals of the CSs observed by MAVEN in the near-Mars tail at the distances from the planet ~1.5–1R _M , where R _M is the radius of Mars. We analyse the spatial structure of the CSs and estimate their thickness for different magnetic configurations and relative abundance of the heavy and light ions in the sheets. It is shown that, similarly to the CSs in the Earth’s magnetotail, the thickness and complexity of the spatial structure of the Maritan CSs (i.e. the presence of embedded and / or peripheral current structures) depend on the magnetic configuration of the sheets, which, in turn, affects the fraction of the quasi-adiabatic particles in the CSs.     

Paleoceanology of the Sea of Azov in the Holocene (Based on Geological Survey Data and Investigation of Malacofauna on the Dolgaya Spit)

Oceanology - The article presents the results of investigations conducted by members of SSC RAS on the Dolgaya Spit in 2019–2020. The following types of data are analyzed: satellite imagery,...     

Influence of Oxygen Ions on the Structure of the Thin Current Sheet in the Earth’s Magnetotail

Geomagnetism and Aeronomy - During geomagnetic substorms, the current sheet in the Earth’s magnetotail can transversely reduce in thickness from a few radii of the Earth (RE) to one to...     

Water Scarcity and the Role of Groundwater in Salinization of the Don Avandelta

Doklady Earth Sciences - This paper reports on the seasonal changes in the regimes of mineralization in the Don delta. This study was based on the database of the automatic hydrometeorological...     

A condition for the existence of quasi-periodic nonlinear internal waves in the ocean shelf zone

Free internal gravity waves, which are typical of the shelf ocean zone are studied. A necessary condition for the existence of nonlinear wave disturbances quasi-periodic in time in a continuously stratified sea with variable depth H is found in the quasistatic and the “hard cap” approximation with respect to dissipative factors and latitudinal variation in the Coriolis parameter. The obtained assessment is equivalent to the condition obtained within the framework of linear theory for the case of the f-plane and a constant depth H.     

Spatial Scales of Super Thin Current Sheets with MMS Observations in the Earth’s Magnetotail

Geomagnetism and Aeronomy - We studied the magnetic configuration and determined the spatial scales of the super thin current sheets observed by MMS in the Earth’s magnetotail during the...