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Detailed Reference Information
McComas et al. 1994
McComas, D.J., Gosling, J.T., Hammond, C.M., Moldwin, M.B., Phillips, J.L. and Forsyth, R.J. (1994). Magnetic reconnection ahead of a coronal mass ejection. Geophysical Research Letters 21: doi: 10.1029/94GL01077. issn: 0094-8276.

On 29 November 1990 the Ulysses spacecraft passed through a series of interplanetary structures which suggest that reconnection had occurred on open field lines ahead of a coronal mass ejection (CME), changing the magnetic topology of the upstream region. We observe in sequence 1) a heat flux dropout, 2) a region of counterstreaming halo electrons which does not appear to be a CME, and 3) a region of counterstreaming halo electrons which is a CME. We suggest an interpretation in which upstream of the CME Ulysses passed first through a region magnetically disconnected from the Sun and then through a region magnetically connected back to the solar corona at both ends, both of which were created by reconnection of open field lines ahead of the CME. Such reconnection provides a method for producing a heat flux dropout/counterstreaming superathermal electron pair of signatures in interplanetary space that has not been previously described. ¿ American Geophysical Union 1994

BACKGROUND DATA FILES

Abstract

Keywords
Interplanetary Physics, Discontinuities, Interplanetary Physics, Interplanetary magnetic fields, Interplanetary Physics, Solar wind plasma, Space Plasma Physics, Magnetic reconnection
Journal
Geophysical Research Letters
http://www.agu.org/journals/gl/
Publisher
American Geophysical Union
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