Voyager 1 Jupiter Plasma Science Derived Ion Parameters, March 1979

Plasma parameters from the Voyager 1 spacecraft outbound from Jupiter, covering the magnetotail and solar wind regions. The dataset contains derived ion density and thermal speed measurements sampled every 96 seconds from March 13 to March 24, 1979. It was produced by the instrument principal investigator John D. Richardson for NASA.

Use Cases

• Modeling magnetosheath plasma dynamics based on derived ion density and thermal speed parameters.
• Analyzing solar wind properties using reliable plasma data from the outbound trajectory.
• Studying the magnetopause boundary region using contextual magnetotail data.
• Comparing plasma parameters derived via Maxwellian fit and moment methods.

Strengths

• Data sampling rate is precisely 96 seconds.
• Time range is explicitly defined from 1979-03-13T00:01:43.491Z to 1979-03-24T23:20:06.519Z.
• The description specifies that M-mode data are the best to use in most regions of the magnetosheath.

Limitations

• Magnetotail data are explicitly described as unreliable, with density usable only as an upper limit.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Derived from Voyager 1 Plasma Science (PLS) instrument measurements.

Time Range

1979-03-13T00:01:43.491Z to 1979-03-24T23:20:06.519Z