Geomagnetic Virtual Observatories: monitoring geomagnetic secular variation with the Swarm satellites

Magnus D. Hammer*, Grace A. Cox, William J. Brown, Ciarán D. Beggan, Christopher C. Finlay

*Corresponding author for this work

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    Abstract

    We present geomagnetic main field and secular variation time series, at 300 equal-area distributed locations and at 490 km altitude, derived from magnetic field measurements collected by the three Swarm satellites. These Geomagnetic Virtual Observatory (GVO) series provide a convenient means to globally monitor and analyze long-term variations of the geomagnetic field from low-Earth orbit. The series are obtained by robust fits of local Cartesian potential field models to along-track and East–West sums and differences of Swarm satellite data collected within a radius of 700 km of the GVO locations during either 1-monthly or 4-monthly time windows. We describe two GVO data products: (1) ‘Observed Field’ GVO time series, where all observed sources contribute to the estimated values, without any data selection or correction, and (2) ‘Core Field’ GVO time series, where additional data selection is carried out, then de-noising schemes and epoch-by-epoch spherical harmonic analysis are applied to reduce contamination by magnetospheric and ionospheric signals. Secular variation series are provided as annual differences of the Core Field GVOs. We present examples of the resulting Swarm GVO series, assessing their quality through comparisons with ground observatories and geomagnetic field models. In benchmark comparisons with six high-quality mid-to-low latitude ground observatories we find the secular variation of the Core Field GVO field intensities, calculated using annual differences, agrees to an rms of 1.8 nT/yr and 1.2 nT/yr for the 1-monthly and 4-monthly versions, respectively. Regular sampling in space and time, and the availability of data error estimates, makes the GVO series well suited for users wishing to perform data assimilation studies of core dynamics, or to study long-period magnetospheric and ionospheric signals and their induced counterparts. The Swarm GVO time series will be regularly updated, approximately every four months, allowing ready access to the latest secular variation data from the Swarm satellites. [Figure not available: see fulltext.].

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number54
    JournalEarth, Planets and Space
    Volume73
    Issue number1
    Number of pages22
    ISSN1343-8832
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2021

    Bibliographical note

    Funding Information:
    We wish to thank the European Space Agency (ESA) for the prompt availability of Swarm L1b data. The staff of the geomagnetic observatories and INTERMAGNET are thanked for supplying high-quality observatory data. High-resolution 1-min OMNI data were provided by the Space Physics Data Facility (SPDF), NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. We like to thank two anonymous reviewers for comments that helped improve the manuscript.

    Funding Information:
    This study was funded by ESA through the Swarm DISC GVO project, contract no. 4000109587.

    Keywords

    • Earth’s core
    • Geodynamo
    • Geomagnetism
    • Secular variation
    • Swarm satellites

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