Electron Temperature Gradients Regulate the Duration of Two-Stage Plasmasphere Refilling

Abstract

After geomagnetic storms erode the plasmasphere, cold ionospheric plasma flows along magnetic field lines to refill the depleted flux tubes. Previous studies have suggested that refilling undergoes two stages characterized by their distinct refilling rates; however, not all observations or models exhibit this feature, and a recent analysis indicates that only a subset of refilling events display two clear stages. In this study, we show that the magnitude of the field-aligned electron temperature gradient and initial/boundary temperature regulate the durations of both the early and late stages. Performing multivariate regressions from the results of simulating early and late-time refilling demonstrated that the length of each stage uniquely depends on the temperature gradient and initial/boundary temperature. These results suggest that variations in the temperature profile may explain why some refilling events appear single-staged in observations.