Jovian UV Aurora's Response to the Solar Wind: Hisaki EXCEED and Juno Observations

Abstract

We summarize Jupiter's ultraviolet (UV) auroral response to solar wind dynamic pressure variations during Juno's approach to Jupiter in 2016. The response time of Jupiter's aurora to external drivers has thus far been unknown owing to a sparsity of upstream in situ solar wind measurements. Combining the Juno solar wind observations with continuous UV aurora data obtained by Hisaki EXCEED (Extreme Ultraviolet Spectroscope for Exospheric Dynamics) and Juno UV spectrograph, the UV aurora brightenings in response to three major shock arrivals showed time lags of 10–15 hr. These time lags are longer than the time required for ballistic propagation of the shocks by the solar wind. In addition to that puzzle, while an enhancement in the UV auroral power was observed with an increase in dynamic pressure to ~0.03 nPa, no associated brightening was observed with a dynamic pressure elevation of >0.1 nPa. These imply that internal magnetospheric aspects need to be taken into consideration to fully resolve the issue.