Solar cycle effects in planetary geomagnetic activity: Analysis of 36‐year long OMNI dataset

Abstract

Abstract.NSSDC's OMNI dataset, which now spans 1963-1999, contains a collection of hourly means of interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) and solar wind (SW) plasma parameters measured near the Earth's orbit, as well as some auxiliary data. We report a study of solar cycle effects in planetary geomagnetic activity in which 27-day averages of several OMNI parameters are compared with equivalent Kp and Dst averages. Some established trends in these parameters over solar cycles are confirmed; for example, it is concluded that changes in the magnitude (rather than in direction) constitute the primary solar cycle variation in the IMF. However, this study also reveals that long-term changes in planetary geomagnetic activity are driven more actively by solar wind-magnetosphere coupling of an electrodynamic nature rather than by plasma transport into the magnetosphere. This suggests that ambient (background) interplanetary "electric" environment (in which the Earth's magnetosphere is immersed over the solar cycles) may play a more significant role in causing changes in the frequency of geomagnetic storms and substorms than previously realized.

Prediction of Kp index using NARMAX models with a robust model structure selection method

“…The correlation between Kp index and solar wind parameters has been confirmed in the literature (see for example [3][4] [5]). There are plenty of studies aiming to build models to represent the relationship between Kp index and solar wind parameters.…”

The correlation between solar and geomagnetic activity – Part 1: Two-term decomposition of geomagnetic activity

“…The fact that there are more decays at solar maxima than at solar minima is related to or can explain (partly) the following phenomena. (i) The "pearls" of ∼ 1-year pulsations in B z are less near the maxima (Papitashvili et al, 2000).…”

Solar origins of intense geomagnetic storms in 2002 as seen by the CORONAS-F satellite

“…Many works are devoted to this question. We mention here only a few recent studies where these problems are approached from different points of view (Bothmer and Schwenn, 1998;Papitashvili et al, 2000;Cane et al, 2000;Richardson et al, 2001;Veselovsky et al, 2002;Huttunen et al, 2002;Zhukov, 2005, and references therein). The quantitative criteria on the Sun are not established in this respect, but the qualitative side is becoming clearer after years of studies (Temerin and Li, 2002).…”