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Abstract:
The ring current in the Earth's magnetosphere plays a crucial role in geospace and atmospheric dynamics, as its particle flux is strongly enhanced during geomagnetic active times. Predicting these enhancements is crucial for understanding the impacts of geomagnetic storms on the Earth's magnetic field, geospace, and atmosphere, and for mitigating the hazards they pose to spacecraft. However, current simulations of intense geomagnetic storms often overestimate the electron flux on the nightside close to Earth. By investigating this discrepancy and analyzing the electrons’ drift trajectories, we find that the overestimation is caused by insufficient amount of electron loss. This is validated by comparing the predicted and measured precipitating electron flux into the atmosphere. We find that the most likely cause for the lack of electron loss are inaccuracies in the description of scattering, associated with chorus waves and electrostatic electron cyclotron harmonic waves, which are currently not included in ring current models. Our findings emphasize the importance of improving our understanding and modeling of the ring current to accurately simulate the dynamics of particles in this region.
