31st Annual Meeting of the DPS, October 1999
Session 78. Io: Neutral Atmosphere, Ionosphere, Magnetospheric Interactions, and Plasma Torus
Contributed Oral Parallel Session, Friday, October 15, 1999, 4:00-5:30pm, Sala Pietro d'Abano

[Previous] | [Session 78] | [Next]


[78.09] MHD Modeling of Io's Interaction with the Plasma Torus: Prediction for the Upcoming Galileo Flybys

J. Linker (Science Applications International Corp.), M. McGrath (Space Telescope Science Inst.), M. Kivelson, R. Walker, K. Khurana (IGGP/UCLA)

The interaction of Io with the plasma surrounding it has been a subject of interest for 35 years. Despite the long history of observations and theory, recent observations from both the Galileo spacecraft and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) have only served to deepen the controversies surrounding this unusual satellite and its interaction with the Io plasma torus. The upcoming Galileo encounter with Io complemented by joint observing from HST and ground-based observers offers the hope of resolving some of these controversies. In this talk we will present predictions of our MHD model for Galileo and HST observations; in particular, we will compare the predictions for different assumptions about Io and its environment.


[Previous] | [Session 78] | [Next]