Journal article
LADEE/LDEX observations of lunar pickup ion distribution and variability
Geophysical research letters, Vol.43(7), pp.3069-3077
04/16/2016
DOI: 10.1002/2016GL068393
Abstract
We report fortuitous observations of low‐energy lunar pickup ion fluxes near the Moon while in the solar wind by the Lunar Dust Experiment (LDEX) on board the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE). We describe the method of observation and the empirical calibration of the instrument for ion observations. LDEX observes several trends in the exospheric ion production rate, including a scale height of approximately 100 km, a positive, linear correlation with solar wind flux, and evidence of a slight enhancement near 7–8 h local time. We compare the LDEX observations to both LADEE Neutral Mass Spectrometer ion mode observations and theoretical models. The LDEX data are best fit by total exospheric ion production rates of ≈6 × 103 m−3 s−1 with dominant contributions from Al+, CO+, and Ar+, although the LDEX data suggest that the aluminum neutral density and corresponding ion production rate are lower than predicted by recent models.
Key Points
LDEX observes lunar exospheric pickup ions through integrator channel at high time/spatial resolution
Ion production scale height of 100 km, peak near 0800 LT, and linear dependence on solar wind flux
Comparison to model suggests Ar+ and CO+ as dominant ion species, with possible contribution from Al+
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- LADEE/LDEX observations of lunar pickup ion distribution and variability
- Creators
- A. R Poppe - University of California, BerkeleyJ. S Halekas - University of IowaJ. R Szalay - Southwest Research InstituteM Horányi - University of Colorado BoulderZ Levin - University of Colorado BoulderS Kempf - University of Colorado Boulder
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Geophysical research letters, Vol.43(7), pp.3069-3077
- DOI
- 10.1002/2016GL068393
- ISSN
- 0094-8276
- eISSN
- 1944-8007
- Number of pages
- 9
- Grant note
- NASA (#NAS5-02099) NASA LASER program (#NNX13AJ97G) NASA LADEE Guest Investigator (#NNX13AO71G) German Center for Aviation and Space (DLR) (50-OC-0302) German Ministry for Economy and Technology
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 04/16/2016
- Academic Unit
- Physics and Astronomy
- Record Identifier
- 9984199781102771
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