Comparing the diurnal variations in the SuperMAG auroral electrojet indices SML and SMU

Diurnal variations of the SuperMAG auroral electrojet indices （SML and SMU） were examined for the period of 1980-2010, and the differences between SML and SMU were especially analyzed. The diurnal variation of SML with a maximum at around 1100 UT has a prenoon- postnoon asymmetry. At solstices, the diurnal variation of SML is much stronger than that at equinoxes. For the SMU, two maxima are recorded in the diurnal variation with the bigger one at 1700 UT and the smaller one at 0400 UT. The seasonal variations are not obvious in the UT variation characteristics of SMU although the intensity of SMU is changed remarkably season by season. For both SML and SMU, the contributing stations are located at higher geomagnetic latitude around 1600 UT and at lower geomagnetic latitude around 0400 UT. These results indicate that：（1） the SML is mostly controlled by the convection electric field. Its diurnal variation is mainly correlated with the equinoctial and R-M hypothesis; （2） the SMU is largely controlled by the ionospheric conductance. Its diurnal variation is tightly correlated with the solar radiation.     

Observations of thermospheric vector wind over Yellow River Station during auroral substorm events

Strong disturbances associated with auroral substorms originate from the ionosphere-magnetosphere owing to the effects of the solar wind, and the wind field in the ionosphere is related to such substorm activity. Here, we describe the analysis of four auroral substorm events, for which we employed an all-sky Fabry-Perot interferometer to observe the two-dimensional horizontal wind field and combined the results with data from an all-sky charge-coupled device imager, a fluxgate magnetometer installed at Yellow River Station, and the Super Dual Auroral Radar Network. The results demonstrate that, during auroral substorms, the vector wind field is related closely to variations in the ion drift and geomagnetic field. Moreover, we observed a changing wind field of approximately 300 rn/s in response to variations in the electric and magnetic fields （likely caused by ion drag） and a disturbance of about 200 m/s that we attribute to the interaction of Joule heating and ion drag.