Saturn northern aurorae at solstice from HST observations coordinated with Cassini Grand Finale

Abstract

Throughout 2017, the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) observed the northern far-ultraviolet aurorae of Saturn at northern solstice, during the Cassini Grand Finale. These conditions provided a complete viewing of the northern auroral region from Earth and a maximal solar illumination, expected to maximize the ionosphere-magnetosphere coupling. In this study, we analyze 24 HST images concurrently with Cassini measurements of Saturn's Kilometric Radiation and solar wind parameters predicted by two MHD models. The aurorae reveal highly variable components, down to timescales of minutes, radiating 7 to 124 +/-11 GW. They include a nightside-shifted main oval, unexpectedly frequent and bright cusp emissions and a dayside low latitude oval. On average, these emissions display a strong Local Time dependence with two maxima at dawn and pre-midnight, the latter being newly observed and attributed to nightside injections possibly associated with solstice conditions. These results provide a reference frame to analyze Cassini in situ measurements, whether simultaneous or not.

References in corpus (5)

• Multi-spectral simultaneous diagnosis of Saturns aurorae throughout a planetary rotation
• Properties of Saturn Kilometric Radiation measured within its source region
• Uranus' aurorae past equinox
• Modeling the Solar Wind at the Ulysses, Voyager, and New Horizons Spacecraft
• The Saturnian Kilometric Radiation before the Cassini Grand Finale

Cited by in corpus (4)

• The landscape of Saturn's internal magnetic field from the Cassini Grand Finale
• A pole to pole pressure temperature map of Saturn's thermosphere from Cassini Grand Finale data
• Multilayer hazes over Saturn's hexagon from Cassini ISS limb images
• Magnetic Structure and Propagation of Two Interacting CMEs from the Sun to Saturn