A SIR driven shock observed by thirteen spacecraft: Microphysics study

Abstract:

In this work, we use observations from thirteen spacecraft (STEREO, ACE, WIND, THEMIS and CLUSTER) to study the forward shock driven by a stream interaction region (SIR) on May 2007 when the spacecraft separations covered a range between 2 and 2236 R_E approximately. In order to characterize the whole event we determine the local plasma parameters and the differences of the shock properties observed by each spacecraft during the SIR passage. Additionally, we perform FFT analysis of the corresponding magnetic field fluctuations in the upstream and downstream regions as well as a study on the different particle populations. We found clear differences in the shock profile between the spacecraft as well as different whistler waves and mirror storms at both sides of the forward shock interface respectively.