Abstract During the encounter between the ICE spacecraft and Comet Giacobini-Zinner, intense fluxes of energetic heavy ions were observed at distances up to 4 × 106 km from the comet. These ions were observed with steep energy spectra and highly anisotropic angular distributions, and are consistent with a composition comprising mainly ions from the water group. The flux versus time profiles have a general fall-off with increasing distance from the comet, but are modulated by both changes in the magnetic field direction and the solar wind velocity, the magnetic field variations being mainly responsible for variations on a time scale of minutes, and the solar wind velocity variations being responsible for much larger time-scale modulations, such as the inbound/outbound asymmetry of the intensity profile. In this paper we present correlated observations of heavy ions, the solar wind velocity and the magnetic field direction, and compare the observations of the ions with the theoretical predictions for their variations with distance from the comet, with the solar wind velocity and with the magnetic field direction.


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    Title :

    Observations of the interactions of heavy ions from Comet P/Giacobini-Zinner with the solar wind


    Contributors:
    Sanderson, T.R. (author) / Wenzel, K.-P. (author) / Daly, P.W. (author) / Cowley, S.W.H. (author) / Hynds, R.J. (author) / Smith, E.J. (author) / Bame, S.J. (author) / Zwickl, R.D. (author)

    Published in:

    Publication date :

    1986-01-01


    Size :

    4 pages




    Type of media :

    Article (Journal)


    Type of material :

    Electronic Resource


    Language :

    English



    Observations of the interactions of heavy ions from Comet P/Giacobini-Zinner with the solar wind

    Sanderson, T. R. / Wenzel, K.-P. / Daly, P. W. et al. | NTRS | 1986


    Energetic ion observations during comet Giacobini-Zinner encounter

    Hynds, R.J. / Cowley, S.W.H. / Richardson, I.G. et al. | Elsevier | 1985



    The plasma regime at comet Giacobini-Zinner

    Ogilvie, Keith W. | Elsevier | 1985


    Bulk parameters of water group ions at comet Giacobini-Zinner

    Staines, K. / Balogh, A. / Cowley, S.W.H. et al. | Elsevier | 1992