CurrentSheets&Turbulence

Automated identification
of current sheets in the solar wind

Welcome to the website of the IKI-IZMIRAN inter-institutional project on current sheets!DATA

A three-parameter method of the automated current sheet identification suggested by Olga Khabarova’s team is employed (Khabarova et al., JGR, 2021). The Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) data are used to compute the key parameters on which the method is based. The data are obtained at https://cdaweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/ . We thank the PIs and data providers :

- H3 - ACE Magnetic Field 1-Second Level 2 Data - N.Ness (Bartol Research Institute), and

- ACE/SWEPAM Solar Wind Experiment 64-Second Level 2 Data - D. J. McComas (SWRI).

So far, the 1 AU current sheet database consists of the three-month-length “output_ACE_1s_YYYY_MM-MM.csv” files for 1998-2012. The current sheet lists are compiled with the one-second cadence. We work on the extension of the database and will provide you more data soon!

For 1 AU current sheet lists CLICK HERE

Data description

The plain text files contain information about the current sheet location and the corresponding plasma and interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) parameters:

1. date (location of the current sheet pointed with the one-second resolution)

2. <|B|>, nT (the IMF magnitude)

3. H_DENSITY_#/cc (the solar wind density, 1/cm^3)

4. SW_H_SPEED_km/s (the solar wind proton speed, km/s)

5. H_TEMP_RADIAL_Kelvin (the radial component of the solar wind temperature, K)

6. Beta (the plasma beta β)

7. VA (the Alfvén speed, km/s)

8. B_der (the derivative of <|B|>)

9. Beta_der (the β derivative)

10. VA/V_der (the derivative of the Alfvén speed to the solar wind speed ratio)

The output_current_sheets_per_day.csv file contains the current sheet daily rate and the number of current sheets per day smoothed with a 27-day(point) Savitzky-Golay filter (the 3rd degree polynomial is used). Note that the averaged number of current sheets may show unnaturally decreased values on some days because of data gaps. For statistical aims, we recommend recalculate it, applying interpolation.

Important! If you employ the method and/or use the current sheet database, please refer to the website and cite the following article: Khabarova, O., Sagitov, T., Kislov, R., & Li, G. (2021). Automated identification of current sheets—A new tool to study turbulence and intermittency in the solar wind. Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 126, e2020JA029099. https://doi.org/10.1029/2020JA029099

The 27-day smoothed current sheet daily rate for 1998-2008.

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