MMS 4 Magnetic Ephemeris and Coordinates (MEC) and Support (Tsyganenko 2004 model, Dynamic

Magnetospheric Multiscale 4 (MMS 4) spacecraft position, velocity, attitude, and magnetic ephemeris data at a 30-second time resolution. The data product, created by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, includes magnetic field measurements, field line footpoints, and activity indices like Dst and Kp. It uses the Tsyganenko 2004 magnetic field model for disturbed magnetospheric conditions to calculate coordinates and parameters.

Use Cases

• Modeling magnetospheric field lines based on the Tsyganenko 2004 model and spacecraft position.
• Analyzing space weather activity correlations based on the included Dst and Kp indices.
• Studying particle loss cone dynamics based on the provided northern and southern hemisphere loss cone angles.
• Transforming spacecraft coordinates between systems like GEI, GSE, and SM using the provided rotational quaternions.
• Identifying open versus closed magnetic field lines based on the classification variable mentioned in the description.

Strengths

• Data is derived from a specific, well-defined physical model (Tsyganenko 2004) for disturbed conditions.
• Includes multiple calculated geophysical parameters like L-shell, magnetic local time, and footpoint field strength.
• Provides coordinate transformation tools via rotational quaternions for 6 different systems.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale analysis.
• Data is stored in a BIN format, which may require specialized tools for access and parsing.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Collected by the Magnetospheric Multiscale 4 (MMS 4) spacecraft and processed into Level-2 science data.

Time Range

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Freshness

Last updated 2026-03 13 06:05:04.185951; freshness should be verified.

Geography

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