New Perspectives on the Earth′s Magnetotail, Geophysical Monograph 105

Published by the American Geophysical Union as part of the Geophysical Monograph Series, Volume 105.

On the nightside of the Earth, a long magnetic tail is formed by the tangential stress that is exerted by the solar wind as it flows by the planet. The magnetotail is the nightside extension of the Earth's magnetosphere in which the geomagnetic field is confined by the solar wind, and its framework is formed by the field lines emanating from the polar caps. The magnetotail plays a pivotal role in magnetospheric dynamics as the reservoir of the energy that produces a wide variety of phenomena in the Earth's magnetosphere. The interaction of the magnetotail with the ambient solar wind provides virtually all of the energy to drive auroral and geomagnetic processes.