A new empirical model of the plasmapause location has been developed using density data from the plasma wave receiver onboard the CRRES spacecraft for nearly 1000 orbits. The “plasmapause” is identified here as the innermost sharp gradient in density (change of a factor of 5 in <0.5 L). Such a sharp gradient was observed on 73% of the CRRES inbound and outbound orbits that returned data. The plasmapause location is expressed as a linear function of Kp (previous 12 hour maximum) and local time. The model gives the linear best fit location of the plasmapause as well as the standard deviations of the model parameters.
Moldwin, M. B., Downward, L., Rassoul, H. K., Amin, R., and Anderson, R. R. (2002), A new model of the location of the plasmapause: CRRES results, J. Geophys. Res., 107( A11), 1339, doi:10.1029/2001JA009211 and O'Brien, T. P., and Moldwin, M. B. (2003), Empirical plasmapause models from magnetic indices, Geophys. Res. Lett., 30, 4, 1152. doi:10.1029/2002GL016007