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This report reviews the first results on the ionospheric ion outflow in the Martian magnetosphere by the ion composition experiment ASPERA on Phobos‐2. The measurements show that Mars is characterized by a strong loss of plasma from its topside ionosphere. This loss results from both ion pick‐up due to mass‐loading of the solar wind in the Martian boundary layer and an acceleration mechanism, quite similar to that observed above the Earth's auroral oval, providing intense ionospheric O+ beams of energies up to several keV. A preliminary estimate of the ionospheric outflow from Mars indicates that the planet at present is losing oxygen at a rate of ≈3·1025 ions/s. This corresponds to an evacuation of its present total atmospheric oxygen content (contained in CO2 and O2) in less than 100 million years.

The measurements carried out on the spacecraft Phobos‐2 have revealed that the plasma sheet of the Martian magnetosphere consists mainly of ions of planetary origin, accelerated up to ∼ 1 keV/q. Such an acceleration may result from the action of magnetic shear stresses of the draped field, the ion energy increasing toward the center of the tail where magnetic stresses are stronger. The energy gained by heavy ions does not depend on their mass and are proportional to the ion charge. The mechanism of the ion acceleration is related with the generation of a charge separation electric field, which extracts ions from “ray” structures in the Martian tail.

Abstract. At 1130 UT on November 28, 1995, two spacecraft, Interball-Tail and Geotail, were in a favorable position to study the plasma sheet activity and an auroral breakup observed on the ground near the spacecraft ionospheric footpoints. Both spacecraft were near the neutral sheet, and they were nearly aligned along the magnetic meridian. During the auroral breakup observed at the equatorward half of the auroral oval (also registered as an AKR burst at Interball) both spacecraft

This paper describes the features of the boundary in the plasma ion composition near Mars which separates the region dominated by the solar wind protons from the plasma of planetary origin. This boundary was detected by the ASPERA experiment on Phobos 2. It is argued that the features of this boundary seem to be similar to those of other composition boundaries detected elsewhere: the cometopause near comet Halley, and a boundary in the ion composition which appears near Venus during periods of high solar wind dynamic pressure. Numerical modeling of the solar wind interaction with Mars supports the idea that during solar maximum the interaction of the Martian neutral atmosphere with the solar wind can result in a composition transition from solar wind to planetary ions in the low‐altitude magnetosheath. This transition occurs because of charge exchange of solar wind protons with the neutral atmosphere and photoionization.