Earth Planets Space, 65, 12851294, 2013

Determining field-aligned currents with the Swarm constellation mission

Patricia Ritter, Hermann Luhr, and Jan Rauberg
GFZ German Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany
(Received March 1, 2013; Revised August 14, 2013; Accepted September 9, 2013; Online published November 22, 2013)

Field-aligned currents (FAC) are the prime mechanism for coupling energy from the solar wind into the upper
atmosphere at high latitudes. Knowing their intensity and distribution is of pivotal importance for the selection of
quiet time data at high latitudes to be used in main field analysis. At the same time FACs can be regarded as a key
element for studies of magnetosphere-ionosphere interactions. The Swarm satellite constellation, in particular
the lower pair, provides the opportunity to determine radial currents uniquely. The computation of FACs from the
vector magnetic field data is a straightforward and fast process, applying Amp`eres integral law to a set of four
magnetic field values. In this method the horizontal magnetic field components at a quad of measurement points
sampled by the two satellites moving side-by-side are interpreted. The presented algorithm was implemented as
described here in the Swarm Level-2 processing facility to provide the automatically estimated radial and fieldaligned currents. It was tested with synthetic data in the Swarm Level-1b format. The resulting currents agree
excellently with the input currents of the synthetic model. The data products are computed along the entire orbits.
In addition, the L2 processor calculates also FACs with a 1 Hz time resolution individually from the three single
Swarm satellites.
Key words: Field-aligned currents, ionosphere, constellation mission.

1.

Introduction

Field aligned currents play an important role in space

plasmas. They are able to transfer energy almost loss-less
over large distances. In the magnetosphere, they connect
distant source regions with the high-latitude ionosphere.
There, they drive the entire auroral current system (Untiedt
and Baumjohann, 1993). At lower latitudes, FACs flow
whenever potential differences between the ionospheres of
the two hemispheres build up. Rather well-known are the
interhemispheric FACs connecting the foci of the two Sq
(solar quiet) current systems (e.g. Fukushima, 1979; Park
et al., 2011). To improve knowledge about these processes
it would be desirable to have reliable measurements of the
FACs in near-Earth space. One way to acquire this information is by performing closely-spaced multi-point magnetic field measurements. ESAs Swarm constellation mission provides this opportunity.
A constellation of three satellites can do more than three
single satellites. In this sense, the purpose of the Swarm
Level-2 Processor is to provide advanced data products
that take advantage of the dedicated constellation of three
Swarm satellites (Olsen et al., 2013). Field-aligned currents
computed along track from the magnetic field measured at
single satellites have always suffered from non-uniqueness.
Since the satellite moves through three-dimensional regions
of high current density, the recorded field changes can be
interpreted in terms of current density only if certain assumptions on the current geometry and its stationarity are
c The Society of Geomagnetism and Earth, Planetary and Space SciCopyright

ences (SGEPSS); The Seismological Society of Japan; The Volcanological Society
of Japan; The Geodetic Society of Japan; The Japanese Society for Planetary Sciences; TERRAPUB.

made (Luhr et al., 1996). With measurements being available only along the orbit direction, i.e. along-track, the current distribution has to be generally assumed constant over
the time span of passage and organized in sheets of known
orientation (Luhr et al., 1996; Stauning et al., 2001).
More realistic FAC densities can be computed directly and uniquely from magnetic field measurements if
synchronous, multi-point measurements spanning a twodimensional area in space are available. The two lower
Swarm satellites flying side-by-side provide this type of
datasets. The benefit of constellation processing for the determination of field-aligned currents has been demonstrated
in an ESA-sponsored scientific study during Swarm Mission Phase A (Vennerstrm et al., 2005; Ritter and Luhr,
2006). With the planned constellation of three satellites in
near-polar orbits (inclination 87 ) at two different heights,
one at 530 km and a pair at initially 460 km (Olsen et al.,
2013), the mission is particularly well suited to study the
complex current systems of the polar ionosphere. The lower
pair shall fly side-by-side, separated by only 1.4 in longitude which is equivalent to 150 kilometres in east/west
direction at the equator. The orbits of these two satellites
cross near the poles. The simultaneous measurements of the
two spacecraft, longitudinally spaced, provide the possibility to include the cross-track spatial derivative directly in the
computation and produce more complete results. This allows for the first time to determine the radial current density
and from that field-aligned currents in the ionosphere unambiguously by directly employing Amp`eres law as curlB relation or the surface integral solution (Ritter and Luhr,
2006).
A 3D curl B technique (Dunlop et al., 2002) has been

doi:10.5047/eps.2013.09.006
1285

1286

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

Fig. 1. (a) Sketch of a quad of 4 measurements points needed for the calculation of FAC density at the centre. Points Q1, . . ., Q4 are positions on the
orbit tracks of satellites SwA and SwB connected by route elements d. (b) Measurement points on SwB orbit are selected at slightly shifted times
with respect to SwA, so that a symmetric quad is achieved.

developed for estimating FACs from four-point Cluster data

by taking advantage of the four-spacecraft constellation.
This technique has been applied at mid-altitudes to estimate
FAC densities and compared with success to the results
obtained by the single-spacecraft method (e.g. Marchaudon
et al., 2009).
The method for FAC determination described here,
Amp`eres integral solution, was adapted and developed further for application to Swarm Level-1b data. The algorithm
subsequently presented was implemented in the Level-2
processor to generate one of the Swarm Category-2 (CAT-2)
products that are produced automatically by ESAs processing centre as soon as all input data are available. The implemented processor was tested against the synthetic dataset
generated for our Phase A study (Vennerstrm et al., 2005,
2006; Moretto et al., 2006).
This paper describes the details of the algorithms for
the multi-satellite and single-satellite FAC determination as
implemented in the Level-2 processor (Sections 2 and 3).
An estimate of the uncertainties of provided FAC values
is detailed in Section 4. Section 5 presents an outline of
the output products and their formats. Finally we give
a scientific validation of the derived field-aligned current
densities in Section 6 and an overview of the coordinate
frames used in the algorithm in Section 7.

2.

Dual-Satellite Method

The Swarm satellite constellation, in particular the lower

pair, provides the opportunity to determine radial and fieldaligned currents uniquely. The technique used for estimating the radial current density employs the horizontal B field
components observed by the lower pair of satellites at 4
measurement points forming a symmetric quad. For the
Swarm Phase A study, the traditional form of Amp`eres law,
the curl-B relation, was employed to calculate the vertical
current density, jz :
jz =

1
0


By
Bx

.
dx
dy

(1)

Where 0 is the magnetic permeability, Bx and B y are the

horizontal components of the magnetic field after removal
of the mean magnetic field from the measurements (hereafter called residual field).
The mathematical approach used here is the contour integral in the horizontal plane as also described briefly in Ritter
and Luhr (2006):

1
j=
B d.
(2)
0 A
The integral is performed along the closed path of the connecting lines of the quad points. d is a route element along
the integration path, B is the residual magnetic field vector
(Bx , B y , Bz ) in the coordinate frame of the flight direction
(VHQ, Velocity-Oriented Horizontal Quad, see Section 7),
A is the encircled area, and 0 is the magnetic permeability.
The position, where the obtained current density estimate is
assigned to, is the centre of the quad. The coding of this
approach involves interpolation procedures and simple rotation and subtraction routines. Figure 1 sketches a quad of
4 measurement points, Q1, . . . , Q4, on the orbit tracks of
satellites SwA and SwB, and the integration path encircling
the spanned integration area. The current density obtained
is a mean value of the current densities within the quad.
Also the temporal variations of the currents within the quad
points are averaged over about 20 s.
In the paper at hand the integral method used to determine Swarm Level-2 FAC is explained in detail, contrary
to Ritter and Luhr (2006) that focused on the description of
the curl-B method. The integral method was selected above
the curl-B solution, because the requirements concerning
the geometry of the four measurement points needed for
the calculation of the current density is less stringent. The
integration area spanned by the quad points doesnt necessarily need to be rectangular, while the two components of
spatial derivatives in the curl-B approach have to be orthogonal. The integral method also avoids a division by vanishing cross-track horizontal distances near the orbit crossover
points. In the curl-B technique with its horizontal gradients

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

1287

this might lead to unrealistically high current density values

in this region.
For the determination of FACs the Swarm magnetic field
vector data provided by the Level-1b processor, B L1b , are
used. They are provided together with positions and timestamps in the NEC coordinate frame (North-East-Center, see
Section 7). The following paragraphs will explain the processing steps further.
2.1 Data pre-processing
First, the time series are checked for data gaps, interpolated if gaps are minimal, and/or flagged accordingly. The
FACs are computed, as mentioned before, from residual
magnetic field vector data. That means, the measured magnetic field is corrected for the core, crustal and magnetospheric fields at satellite altitude. For calculating the magnetic field at the orbit positions, initially the following models are utilized: IGRF11 (Finlay et al., 2010) for the core
field, MF7 (Maus et al., 2007) for the lithospheric field, and
part of POMME-6 (Luhr and Maus, 2010) for the external
field. The mean field, i.e. the sum of B COR + B LIT B EXT ,
is subtracted from the measured magnetic field data B L1b :
B RES = B L1b B COR B LIT B EXT

(3)

where B COR is the core magnetic field, B LIT describes the

lithospheric magnetization, and B EXT denotes the magnetic
field from magnetospheric currents. Subsequently the residual B-field data are low-pass filtered to ensure that only currents with spatial scale lengths >150 km are represented.
This scale length corresponds to the east-west separation of
the two satellites at the equator. It is recommended to use
a cut-off period of 1020 sec for this filter to avoid antialiasing. This filter also suppresses Alfv`enic wave parts
(Ishii et al., 1992) in the data, so that only the stationary
part of the FAC is captured by the procedure.
2.2 Definition of quad positions and resampling of data
For the estimation of the radial current density a regular
quad of measurement points is most suitable. The proper
choice of these quads is vital for the quality of the current
density. The distance of the quad points in along-track direction should be comparable, at least in the most interesting regions, with the longitudinal separation, dy, of the orbits. This separation is 150 km at the equator, decreasing
at high latitudes and it vanishes near the geographic poles
(dy 150 km cos (lat)). Hence the time between alongtrack quad points was chosen 5 sec corresponding to 40
km. To avoid collision at the orbit crossovers, the satellites
pass the equator with a time separation of 510 s. This time
separation t is taken into account when selecting the readings of symmetric quad points.
The synchronization of SwB with SwA is done for the
northern and the southern hemisphere passages separately.
The time shift is chosen that the satellites meet virtually
at the crossover of their orbits. In this way, quads are
defined at sampling intervals of 1 s along the time series
of each hemispheric orbit arc. The current positions in
the quad centres and time stamps are estimated from the
mean of the coordinates (ITRF, Conventional Terrestrial
Reference Frame, see Section 7) of all four quad points,
e.g.: tFAC = (t1 + t2 + t3 + t4 )/4.

Fig. 2. Angles and between route elements along-track and cross-track

and the geographic pole.

2.3

Transformation of B into directions of route elements

The route elements di (i = 1 . . . 4, see Fig. 1(a)) of
each quad are determined by the vector differences of the
position vectors to each quad point in the local time/latitude
(LTL, see Section 7) frame. The LT-related longitude, , is
estimated using
= + (t/86400) 360

(4)

where is the geocentric longitude.

The route elements are estimated from the Cartesian position vectors:

d1 = (x1 x2 )2 + (y1 y2 )2 + (z 1 z 2 )2

d2 = (x2 x3 )2 + (y2 y3 )2 + (z 2 z 3 )2

d3 = (x3 x4 )2 + (y3 y4 )2 + (z 3 z 4 )2

d4 = (x4 x1 )2 + (y4 y1 )2 + (z 4 z 1 )2 .
(5)
The route elements, d, mark the path from one quad point
to the next one; for example, d1 marks the path from
point Q 1 to point Q 2 . Figure 3(top) shows the evolution
of the route elements size on one full orbit. Along-trackroute elements along track, d1,3 , are constant, whereas
those between the satellites, d2,4 , are smallest close to the
geographic poles, where the satellites orbits cross.
In order to determine the magnetic field component in
flight direction, the angles between route elements parallel () and route elements transverse () to flight direction
and the respective geographic pole are defined as sketched
in Fig. 2 for the satellites passage of the northern hemisphere. The equations for deriving the angles and take

1288

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

into account the spherical shape of the ionosphere. They

are based on spherical geometry and make use of great circle distances. The basic equation is the sine formula for
triangles on a sphere:
sin (arc( ))
sin (arc())
=
.
sin ( )
sin ()

(6)

Where arc( ) and arc() represent the sides of the triangle

opposite to the respective angles and .
1 =

asin


sin |2 1 | sin 2
sin[acos(cos 1 cos 2 +sin 1 sin 2 cos(2 1 ))]
(7)


sin 1
2 = asin
sin 1
sin 2
4 =


sin |3 4 | sin 3
asin
sin[acos(cos 3 cos 4 +sin 3 sin 4 cos(3 4 ))]


sin 4
3 = asin
sin 4
sin 3
2 =


sin |3 2 | sin 3
asin
sin[acos(cos 2 cos 3 +sin 2 sin 3 cos(3 2 ))]
(8)


sin 2
3 = asin
sin 2
sin 3
1 =


sin |4 1 | sin 4
asin
sin[acos(cos 4 cos 1 +sin 4 sin 1 cos(4 1 ))]


sin 1
4 = asin
sin 1 .
sin 4

Fig. 3. Top: Route elements d1,3 along-track are constant, whereas

the cross-track ones, d2,4 are smallest close to the geographic poles
(the crossings are located at indices 1400 (near North Pole), 4150 (near
South Pole), 6900 (near North Pole)); bottom: variation of angles and
along the same orbit (descending arc (14004150) ascending arc
(41516900)).

BQ i (i ) = BxQ i cos i + B yQ i sin i

(10)

with i = 1, 2 for spacecraft SwB and with i = 3, 4 for

spacecraft SwA.
B (i ) is aligned with the axis along flight direction at
any one of the quad points Q i . B (i ) is aligned with
the transverse axis of the quad, i.e. the connection line between two orbit-synchronous measurement points of SwA
and SwB (see Eqs. (7), (8)). Q i refer to the quad points
defined above. The values of B are fed into the integral
equation for the determination of the radial current density.
2.4 Calculation of radial currents by integration
From the rotated B vector the four product terms Pi for
In all equations above, i refers to the co-latitude and i to
the
integral can be estimated from the sums of the horizontal
the longitude of a given quad point in the LTL frame. In the
fields.
We use averages of the magnetic field values at the
southern hemisphere, the angles are estimated relative to the
end
points
of the route elements:
South pole. However, the equations above can be used for
the processing of either hemisphere, as the sign switches of
1
P1 = (BQ 1 (1 ) + BQ 2 (2 )) d1
(11)
the angles at the equator. When the satellites cross close
2
to the geographic poles, the angles and need to be
1
P2 = (BQ 2 (2 ) + BQ 3 (3 )) d2
adapted to account for sign switches of the components.
2
Further details are given in the Detailed Processing Model
1
P3 = (BQ 3 (3 ) + BQ 4 (4 )) d3
Document (Swarm Level 2 Processing System Consortium,
2
2012).
1 Q4
P4 = (B (4 ) + BQ 1 (1 )) d4 .
Figure 3(bottom) shows the evolution of angles
2
and after this adaption on one full orbit.
Both
angles vary smoothly and steadily along the orbit. The contour integral (Eq. (2)) is performed along the closed
Only jumps by 180 at the orbit crossings.
On path of the connecting lines of the quad points. d is a
the descending arc, takes values within the range route element along the integration path, B is the measured
[90 . . . 0 . . . 90 ], on the ascending arc, the angles magnetic field vector (Bx , B y , Bz ) in the coordinate frame
range between [90 . . . 180 . . . 90 ].
The angle of the flight direction (VHQ). Practically the integral is

ranges from [0 . . . 90 . . . 0 ] on the descending arc, performed byadding the product terms Pi :
whereas it takes values of [180 . . . 90 . . . 180 ] on the asBd = (P1 + P2 + P3 + P4 ).
(12)
cending arc.
The angles and are then used to transform the resid- Division by the magnetic permeability, , and the quad
0
ual magnetic fields from NEC into the flight direction frame area, A, yields the radial current density j :
r
VHQ (Velocity-oriented Horizontal Quad):
1
jr =
(P1 + P2 + P3 + P4 )/1000.
(13)
BQ i (i ) = BxQ i cos i B yQ i sin i
(9)
0 A

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

If the route elements, like the position radii, and the enclosed area A are given in [m] and the magnetic field readings in [nT], the values need to be divided by 1000 to obtain
the current density in units of [A/m2 ].
The integration area is the area encircled by the route
elements d (Fig. 1(a)):




1
1
A=
(d2 + d4 ) d1 sin
(1 1 + 2 2 )
2
2


1
+d3 sin
.
(14)
(3 3 + 4 4 )
2

1289

satellite data, the current is generally assumed to flow in

current sheets perpendicular to the magnetic meridian. Ideally, the field-aligned current, j
is computed from the temporal gradient of the azimuthal magnetic field component
and the spacecraft velocity along the meridional component
in the mean field-aligned coordinate (MFA, see Section 7)
frame:
1 d B yMFA
j
=
.
(17)
0 dt VxMFA
For the actual implementation in the Level-2 processor, we
chose a different approach. To avoid singularities of the velocity in the MFA system near the equators, the measurements are transformed into the spacecraft velocity frame
(VSC, see Section 7) and the field-aligned currents are assumed to flow in sheets perpendicular to the orbit plane.
Obviously the real current geometry may deviate from this
ideal setting. However, the simplistic approach described
here was chosen above more sophisticated methods such as
Minimal Variance Analysis to guarantee provide a fast and
reliable automatic data processing. Deviations from the assumption given above are accounted for by the estimation
of uncertainties detailed in Section 4. The field gradients
and velocities are computed at time spacings of dt = 1 s.
In case of the single-satellite solutions, no filtering of the
data is performed. Therefore this technique resolves also
small-scale structures.
In the VSC frame the two horizontal velocity components
VxVSC and VyVSC are equal:

Here, we allow for a certain distortion of the area framed by

the symmetric quad. This radial current density is computed
at each of the quads at 1 s intervals along the entire orbits.
Close to the geographic poles, no radial currents can be
estimated if the horizontal spacecraft distance d2 or d4
is too small. Initially, we chose 3 km for the minimum
distance of the satellites (Ritter and Luhr, 2006). This is
the case for geographic latitudes > 86 and causes a data
gap of 15 s near the poles, occurring typically in the quiet
polar cap region.
2.5 Determination of field-aligned currents
The Swarm L1b data is given in the Earth-fixed coordinate system (NEC): i.e. the three coordinate axes are fixed
with respect to the rotating Earths surface. The radial current, jr , computed in the previous section from these data is
also presented in this system. To obtain the current density
flowing along the mean magnetic field, i.e. the field-aligned
current, this radial current component has to be completed
by the inclination of the mean magnetic field. The mean
VxVSC = VxNEC cos + VyNEC sin
(18)
magnetic field vector BMF at each current position is comVSC
NEC
NEC
Vy
= Vx sin + Vy cos .
puted as the sum of the core, crustal and magnetospheric
model fields in the NEC frame (see Eq. (3)). The mean
Based on this condition, the rotation angle can be derived
field inclination is estimated from the above models at each
from the ratio of the difference and sum of the V NEC comcurrent position:
ponents:

MF


Bz
.
I = tan1 
(15)
VxNEC VyNEC
1
= tan
.
(19)
BxMF2 + B yMF2
V NEC + V NEC
x

The full field-aligned current density, j

, is obtained by
dividing the radial current reading, jr , by the sine of the
inclination angle:
jr
j
=
.
(16)
sin I
The FAC density comes in units of [A/m2 ]. To avoid unrealistically large FAC densities around the magnetic equator
due to near-horizontal inclinations, no FAC values will be
estimated for magnetic field inclinations, |I |, smaller than
30 , i.e. about 15 in latitude off the magnetic equator.
The radial current densities are reported all the way across
the equator and thus can be used to monitor the vertical currents driven by the F-region dynamo.
More details of the processing approach used for estimating the Swarm FAC products can be found in the Detailed
Processing Model Document (Swarm Level 2 Processing
System Consortium, 2012).

The angle is also used for the transformation of the magnetic field from the NEC into the VSC frame:
BxVSC = BxNEC cos + B yNEC sin

(20)

B yVSC = BxNEC sin + B yNEC cos .

The ionospheric radial current (IRC) density is computed
from the horizontal gradients of B VSC (i.e. differences between two successive measurements, e.g. BxVSC = BxVSC

2
VSC
BxVSC
)
and
the
horizontal
velocity
components
of
V
1
(Luhr et al., 1996):


d B yVSC
1
d BxVSC
1000.
(21)
VSC
jr =
20 dt VxVSC
Vy

Since the velocities Vx and Vy have the same values, the

magnetic field variations Bx and B y are weighted equally
3. Determination of the Single-Satellite Solution (Luhr et al., 1996). If the velocities are given in [m/s]
The single-satellite FAC processing is done in a sepa- and the magnetic field measurements in [nT], the current
rate step. For the simple FAC determination from single- estimates are obtain in the units [A/m2 ]. The positions

1290

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

assigned to the currents are the centres between the two

measurement points.
As for the multi-satellite solution, the radial current component needs to be completed by the inclination of the magnetic field, as outlined in Eq. (16), to represent the FAC density.

4.

Uncertainties of Radial and Field-Aligned Currents

The formal uncertainty calculation for the IRC / FACs is

based on the following assumptions:
Biases, bmf, of any magnetic field reading (SwA,
SwB, or SwC) are 1 nT (Mission Requirements Document, 2004); they do not change during the 5 s interval between two quad point readings;
Resolutions (digitisation noise), rmf, of any measure- Fig. 4. Log10 of uncertainties of IRC ( jr ) and FAC ( j
, line interrupted
near the equator) along the satellite path from the southern to the northment magnetic field reading (SwA, SwB, or SwC) are
ern hemisphere.
0.1 nT (Mission Requirements Document, 2004);
Each magnetic field reading has an uncertainty of

bmf rmf.

2
2
Positions and hence the route elements have no uncerd2
2 rmfSW1 + 2 rmfSW2
tainty (Medium Orbit Determination MOD, 1 m)
 

These numbers represent performance characteristics of
d1
1000.
+
2 rmf2SW1 + 2 rmf2SW2
the Swarm Level-1b data products.
(24)
The two route elements along-track are equally long.
So are the two route elements across-track. d1 = d3
and d2 = d4 .

For the product terms Pi of the integral (Eq. (11))

certainties along the hemispheres are:



1

P1  (bmfSW2 2rmfSW2 ) d1 
2

1
P2  (bmfSW2 rmfSW2
2


+ bmfSW1 rmfSW1 ) d2 



 1

P3  (bmfSW1 2rmfSW1 ) d3 
2

 1
P4  (bmfSW1 rmfSW1
2


+ bmfSW2 rmfSW2 ) d4 

Note that the biases and resolutions of independent measurements are added as squares in the root terms. The secthe un- ond term is constant, since the route element d1 doesnt
vary along the orbit. Hence the variation of the ICR uncertainty depends entirely on the variation of the cross-track
(22) route elements d2 . The IRC uncertainty is largest in the
high latitude regions, where d2 gets very small, and minimal around the equator. The obtained formal uncertainties
range from 12 to 430 [nA/m2 ] (see Fig. 4). Uncertainties
of the mean magnetic field models cancel in the integration
process, because they are based on scalar potentials.
For the single-satellite solution, an additional uncertainty
is due to the unknown orientation of the current sheet. It
generally causes an underestimation of the current density.
We assume a deficit of 15% on average of the current estimate accounting for a tilt angle up to 45 . With these
assumptions the current calculated in Eq. (21) has an uncertainty of:


With above assumptions the sum of these terms yields:



Pi =
bmf2SW1 + bmf2SW2
i=1:4

1
jr =
20 dt

2 rmf2 + 2 rmf2
|V VSC |



15%( jr ).


2 rmf2SW1 + 2 rmf2SW2 d1

2 rmf2SW1 + 2 rmf2SW2 d2

(23)

Using the integration area given in Eq. (14) in the simplified

form A = d1 d2 we obtain for the uncertainty of the
integral Eq. (13):

1
jr =
bmf2SW1 + bmf2SW2
0

1000
(25)

Gradients are estimated from two readings of the same

satellite and are assumed to have a resolution of 1 rmf. The
velocity components in Eq. (21) are constant along the orbit:
|V VSC | = VxVSC = VyVSC 5.3 km/s.
(26)
Hence the uncertainty estimate of the single-satellite radial
current can be quantified as
jr = 15 nA/m2 15%( jr ).

(27)

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

1291

Table 1. List of parameters contained in the IRC/FAC data product.

Variable Name
Timestamp
Latitude
Longitude
Radius
IRC
IRC Error
FAC
FAC Error
Flags
Flags F
Flags B
Flags q

Data Type
CDF EPOCH
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF DOUBLE
CDF UINT4
CDF UINT4
CDF UINT4
CDF UINT4

Description
Time stamp in UTC
geographic latitude [deg.]
geographic longitude [deg.]
geographic radius [m]
radial current density [A/m2 ]
uncertainty of current density [A/m2 ]
Field-aligned current (FAC) density [A/m2 ]
uncertainty of FAC density [A/m2 ]
flags related to IRC/FAC processing
flags passed through from L1b
flags passed through from L1b
flags passed through from L1b

Table 2. List of problems reported by the processing Flag Flags.

Digit-Nr.
1
2

Value
0/N
0/N

0/N

0/N

0/N

0/N

0/N

0/N

9
10

0/1
0/1

Meaning of digit Flags > 0

Data gap < 5 sec; data were interpolated linearly;
Data is in filter tuning range due to larger data gap before and/or after the gap (gap > 5 sec);
0 for single-satellite processing (no filter employed).
no EST (external part of DST; Maus and Weidelt, 2004) data were available because no DST
was available for magnetospheric field calculation; instead default value was used.
no IST (internal part of DST; Maus and Weidelt, 2004) data were available because no DST
was available for magnetospheric field calculation; instead default value was used.
no Em (merging electric field; Kan and Lee, 1979) data was available because solar wind data
were not available for magnetospheric field calculation; instead default value was used.
no interplanetary magnetic field, IMF, was available for magnetospheric field calculation;
instead default value was used.
no solar flux parameter, F10.7, was available for magnetospheric field calculation;
instead default value was used.
No magnetospheric field coefficients were available; magnetospheric field is set to 0;
resulting FACs are slightly less reliable.
IRC = NaN and FAC = NaN because latitude | | > 86 near geogr. pole
FAC = NaN because inclination |I | < 30 near magn. Equator

Uncertainties due to the mean magnetic field subtracted in

the preprocessing step may also play a role and are estimated to account for 5% of the current density.
The FAC uncertainty is determined by dividing the ICR
uncertainty by the sine of the inclination angle:
j
=

jr
.
sin I

(28)

The inclination-induced uncertainty is small in the high latitude regions and increases towards the equator (see Fig. 4).

5.

Description of the Level-2 IRC/FAC Product

The radial and field-aligned current densities are calculated by the Swarm Level-2 processor as an automatically computed product. The product is provided using the
dual-satellite method on the lower pair of satellites SwA
and SwB (Swarm L2 product name: FAC TMS 2F), and
the single-satellite solution for each of the Swarm spacecraft SwA, SwB, and SwC individually (Swarm L2 product
name: FACxTMS 2F, x=A,B,C). The IRC/FACs data are
given with a time resolution of 1 Hz. For the dual-satellite
solution the data are filtered, hence the scale size of the resulting current density is >150 km. The unfiltered 1 Hz

single-satellite solution has a scale length of >15 km. The

dual satellite data product and the three single satellite solutions are provided in separate files. The main part of each of
the L2-FAC products consists of timestamp, position, IRC
density, FAC density, product flag and Level-1b quality flag.
These parameters are listed in Table 1.
The processing Flag (Flags) has 10 individual and independent digits, each of which gives information about a
different problem that may have occurred during the processing chain at each position of current density:
Digits 18 report problems that may have occurred at one
or more of the measurement points used for the computation
of a current density value. Values 0N mark the number of
points that were affected by that problem: N = 1 . . . 4 for
normal FAC processing (4 measurement points involved),
N = 1 . . . 2 for single-satellite processing (2 measurement points involved).
At each current position, the flag values of the measurement points concerned were added. The values of the digits
have the following interpretation:
0: default, none of the measurement points involved
had the problem and processing was executed normally; the computed current density at that position

1292

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

is good.
1 . . . N : One or more measurement points had the
problem and a work-around was performed; the computed current density at that position might not be as
good as it would be without the problem. It is not important, which one of the points had the problem.
Digits 910 report whether the NaN value of the current
density at this position is intended or not:
0: default; if a NaN occurs at this record, the reason for
the NaN is not known and results from computational
problems. Normally this should not occur.
1: the NaN at this current position is intended: the
current position is either near the geographic pole or
near the magnetic equator.
Table 2 lists the problems reported by the 10 digits of
Flags.
Fig. 5. Comparison of the resulting IRC and the model input current on a
For each current estimate, the Level-1b flag values of the
polar passage across the northern hemisphere.
measurement points concerned were added in the same way,
as described for the processing flag.

6.

Scientific Validation of the Level-2 FAC Product

To validate the radial current algorithm we used the synthetic dataset as employed for the phase A study (Vennerstrm et al., 2005, 2006; Moretto et al., 2006). For generating this test dataset, a global Magneto-Hydro-Dynamics
(MHD) model (GGCM, Raeder, 2003) had been run at the
Community Coordinated Modeling Centre (CCMC) to simulate the interaction of the solar wind with the magnetosphere. The resulting field-aligned currents were closed
in the ionosphere. By employing an empirical model for
the ionospheric conductivity the spatial distribution of the
electric potential was deduced, and Hall and Pedersen currents in the ionosphere could be computed. The 3D distribution of magnetic field perturbations generated by these
currents was derived. The magnetic field components were
then computed at spherical grid points. For a verification of
the processing algorithms synthetic magnetic field measurements were derived along predicted Swarm orbits by cubic
spline interpolation of the model data on the grid points.
The FAC output of both the dual-satellite method and the
single-satellite method (using SWA, SWB and SWC separately) are compared to the FAC densities of the input model
of the test dataset. For this purpose the FACs of this input
model are sampled along the estimated FAC positions of
the data product for validating the current densities resulting from the FAC algorithm.
Figure 5 shows the comparison of the resulting IRC and
the model input current at the northern hemisphere. The
solid red curve shows the radial current computed by the
FAC processor on the 2nd pass across the northern hemisphere on 2000-04-05. The blue curve shows the radial current retrieved from the input model at the computed current
positions of the same polar pass for reference. The satellites cross the polar region from the left to the right side.
Since the model currents cover only a region down to 60
of latitude, signatures equatorward of 60 are meaningless
in terms of currents. The root mean square (rms) of the differences between the computed radial current and the ref-

Fig. 6. Comparison of the resulting IRC and the model input current on a
polar passage across the southern hemisphere.

erence current on a profile [30 ] across the geographic

North Pole is 28.9 nA/m2 . The agreement of the model input and processor result is excellent.
Figure 6 shows that the comparison of results at the
southern hemisphere is on a similar high level. The solid
red curve shows the radial current computed by the FAC
processor on the 3rd pass across the southern hemisphere on
2000-04-05. The root mean square (rms) of the differences
between the computed radial current and the reference current on a profile [30 ] across the geographic South Pole is
26.8 nA/m2 .
A proper scientific validation of the multi-point FAC determination is not possible because there are no real magnetic field data available that could represent Swarm measurements. This task has to be performed as part of the
Swarm validation activity during the early mission phase.
During the in-flight operation the multi-satellite FAC estimates will also be compared with the single-satellite FACs
(from SWA and/or SWB separately).

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

Fig. 7. Observed signatures of the radial current density (CHAMP):

log10(FAC) on the nightside (top) and dayside (bottom). On the nightside, radial current due to plasma bubbles signatures near the magnetic
equator are visible.

In order to give an impression of the size and distribution of field-aligned currents expected along Swarm orbits,
we present in Fig. 7 FAC density magnitudes derived from
CHAMP magnetic field measurements. Since the range of
FAC intensities is so large, a logarithmic scale (log 10) was
chosen. Data are from 02 Jan. 2001. The local time of the
orbit is 23 h (top panel) and 11 h (bottom panel). As expected, there are strong FACs observed in the auroral regions, larger amplitudes in the southern (summer) hemisphere than in the northern. At middle and low latitudes
also FACs are flowing but at much reduced intensity. On
the nightside FAC signatures are primarily related to plasma
bubbles near the magnetic equator or to mid-latitude ionospheric irregularities (e.g. Medium Scale Travelling. Disturbances (MSTIDs), near 40 gm lat. in Fig. 7). On the
dayside at middle latitudes the FAC density is on average
somewhat enhanced. Broad peaks are found around 30
of mag. latitude. They coincide reasonably well with the
typical positions of the Sq foci where potential differences
between the hemispheres are expected to be largest.
This example gives an impression of the rich variety of
different FAC sources that can be investigated with the help
of the Swarm Level 2 data product described here. These
data will be important for correctly characterizing the electrodynamics in the ionosphere.

7.

Coordinate Frames

In the FAC processing, the following coordinate frames

are used:
ITRF: (x, y, z) The IERS Conventional Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF) is an Earth-fixed Cartesian system
used for describing the orbit ephemeris. The origin of the
frame is the Earths centre of mass. The x axis points towards the IERS Reference Meridian (close to Greenwich);
the z axis points to the Reference North Pole; the y axis
completes the triad.
NEC (North-East-Center ITRF): (x, y, z) The x and y
components lie in the horizontal plane, pointing northward
and eastward, respectively. z points to the centre of gravity

1293

of the Earth.
MFA (Mean Field-Aligned): (x, y, z) The MFA frame
is a local coordinate system defined by the ambient magnetic field. It is particularly useful for describing electric
currents in the topside ionosphere. The origin is the local measurement point of the magnetic field. The z axis
is aligned with the unperturbed magnetic field which points
from the southern to the northern hemisphere; the y axis is
perpendicular to the magnetic meridian pointing predominantly eastward; the x axis completes the triad having an
outward component.
VSC (spacecraft velocity): (x, y, z) This frame is introduced for single-satellite FACs calculation. The x and y
components lie in the horizontal plane, pointing 45 away
from the actual flight direction. z points to the centre of the
Earth.
VHQ (Velocity-oriented Horizontal Quad): (, ) The
frame describes the orientation of the route elements with
respect to the direction towards the pole in the LTL frame.
The angle describes the angle between an along-track
route element and the direction towards the pole, whereas
denotes the angle between a route element transverse to
the flight direction and the poleward direction.
LTL (Local TimeLatitude) frame: (r, , ) describe
the geocentric position with respect to the local time (LT)
frame, where r is the radial distance from the Earths centre,
the colatitudes and a local time related longitude.
Acknowledgments. The authors acknowledge the valuable help
and comments by the reviewers. The CHAMP mission was sponsored by the Space Agency of the German Aerospace Center
(DLR) through funds of the Federal Ministry of Economics and
Technology, following a decision of the German Federal Parliament (grant code 50EE0944). The development of the Swarm
L2-FAC prototype was sponsored by the European Space Agency
(ESTEC) through contract No. 4000102140/10/NL/JA.

References
Dunlop, M. W., A. Balogh, K.-H. Glassmeier, and P. Robert, Four-point
Cluster application of magnetic field analysis tools: The Curlometer, J.
Geophys. Res., 107(A11), 1384, doi:10.1029/2001JA005088, 2002.
Finlay, C. C., S. Maus, C. D. Beggan, T. N. Bondar, A. Chambodut, T.
A. Chernova, A. Chuillat, V. P. Golovkov, B. Hamilton, M. Hamoudi,
R. Holme, G. Hulot, W. Kuang, B. Langlais, V. Lesur, F. J. Lowes,
H. Luhr, S. Macmillan, M. Mandea, S. McLean, C. Manoj, M. Menvielle, I. Michaelis, N. Olsen, J. Rauberg, M. Rother, T. J. Sabaka,
A. Tangborn, L. Tffner-Clausen, E. Thebault, A. W. P. Thomson, I.
Wardinksi, Z. Wei, and T. I. Zvereva, International Geomagnetic Reference Field: The eleventh generation, Geophys. J. Int., 183(3), 1216
1230, 10.1111/j.1365-246X.2010.04804.x, 2010.
Fukushima, N., Electric potential difference between conjugate points in
middle latitudes caused by asymmetric dynamo in the ionosphere, J.
Geomag. Geoelectr., 31, 401409, 1979.
Ishii, M., M. Sugiura, T. Iyemori, and J. A. Slavin, Correlation between
magnetic and electric fields in the field-aligned current regions deduced
from DE-2 observations, J. Geophys. Res., 97, 13,877, 1992.
Kan, J. R. and L. C. Lee, Energy coupling function and solar wind
magnetosphere dynamo, Geophys. Res. Lett., 6, 577, 1979.
Luhr, H. and S. Maus, Solar cycle dependence of quiet-time magnetospheric currents and a model of their near-Earth magnetic fields, Earth
Planets Space, 62(10), 843848, doi:10.5047/eps.2010.07.012, 2010.
Luhr, H., J. J. Warnecke, and M. Rother, An algorithm for estimating fieldaligned currents from single-spacecraft magnetic field measurements:
A diagnostic tool applied to Freja satellite data, IEEE Trans. Geosci.
Remote Sens., 34, 13691376, 1996.
Marchaudon, A., J.-C. Cerisier, M. W. Dunlop, F. Pitout, J.-M. Bosqued,
and A. N. Fazakerley, Shape, size, velocity and field-aligned currents

1294

P. RITTER et al.: FIELD-ALIGNED CURRENTS FROM SWARM CONSTELLATION

of dayside plasma injections: A multi-altitude study, Ann. Geophys., 27,

12511266, 2009.
Maus, S. and P. Weidelt, Separating the magnetospheric disturbance magnetic field into external and transient internal contributions using a 1D
conductivity model of the Earth, Geophys. Res. Lett., 31(12), L12614,
doi:10.1029/2004GL020232, 2004.
Maus, S., H. Luhr, M. Rother, K. Hemant, G. Balasis, P. Ritter, and
C. Stolle, Fifth-generation lithospheric magnetic field model from
CHAMP satellite measurements, Geochem. Geophys. Geosyst., 8,
Q05013, doi:10.1029/2006GC00152, 2007.
Mission Requirements Document: Swarm, The Earths Magnetic Field and
Environment Explorers SW-MD-ESA-SY-001, vs. 1, 2004.
Moretto, T., S. Vennerstrm, N. Olsen, L. Rastatter, and J. Raeder, Using global magnetospheric models for simulation and interpretation of
Swarm external field measurements, Earth Planets Space, 58, 439449,
2006.
Olsen, N., E. Friis-Christensen, R. Floberghagen, P. Alken, C. D Beggan,
A. Chulliat, E. Doornbos, J. T. da Encarnac a o, B. Hamilton, G. Hulot, J.
van den IJssel, A. Kuvshinov, V. Lesur, H. Luhr, S. Macmillan, S. Maus,
M. Noja, P. E. H. Olsen, J. Park, G. Plank, C. Puthe, J. Rauberg, P. Ritter, M. Rother, T. J. Sabaka, R. Schachtschneider, O. Sirol, C. Stolle,
E. Thebault, A. W. P. Thomson, L. Tffner-Clausen, J. Velmsky, P. Vigneron, and P. N. Visser, The Swarm Satellite Constellation Application
and Research Facility (SCARF) and Swarm data products, Earth Planets Space, 65, this issue, 11891200, 2013.
Park, J., H. Luhr, and K. W. Min, Climatology of the inter-hemispheric
field-aligned current system in the equatorial ionosphere as observed by
CHAMP, Ann. Geophys., 29(3), 573582, doi:10.5194/angeo-29-573-

2011, 2011.
Raeder, J., Global geospace modeling: Tutorial and review, in Space
Plasma Simulations, edited by J. Buchner, C. T. Dunn, and M. Scholer,
Lecture Notes in Physics, vol. 615, Springer Verlag, Berlin, 2003.
Ritter, P. and H. Luhr, Curl-B technique applied to Swarm constellation
for determining field-aligned currents, Earth Planets Space, 58(4), 463
476, 2006.
Stauning, P., F. Primdahl, J. Watermann, and O. Rasmussen, IMF By related cusp currents observed from the rsted satellite and from ground,
Geophys. Res. Lett., 28, 99102, 2001.
Swarm Level 2 Processing System Consortium, Detailed Processing
Model (DPM) FAC, Swarm Level 2 Processing System, SW-DS-GFZGS-0002, vs. 2d, 2012.
Untiedt, J. and W. Baumjohann, Studies of polar current systems using the
IMS Scandinavian magnetometer array, Space Sci. Rev., 63, 245390,
1993.
Vennerstrm, S., E. Friis-Christensen, H. Luhr, T. Moretto, N. Olsen, C.
Manoj, P. Ritter, L. Rastaetter, A. Kuvshinov, and S. Maus, Swarm
The impact of combined magnetic and electric field analysis and of
ocean circulation effects on Swarm Mission performance: Final Report,
DSRI Report 2/2004, 2005.
Vennerstrm, S., T. Moretto, L. Rastatter, and J. Raeder, Modeling and
analysis of solar wind generated contributions to the near-Earth magnetic field, Earth Planets Space, 57, 451461, 2006.
P. Ritter (e-mail: pritter@gfz-potsdam.de), H. Luhr, and J. Rauberg