Ion-Scale Secondary Flux Ropes Generated by Magnetopause Reconnection as Resolved by MMS

Abstract: New Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) observations of small-scale (approx. 7 ion inertial length radius) flux transfer events (FTEs) at the dayside magnetopause are reported. The 1O km MMS tetrahedron size enables their structure and properties to be calculated using a variety of multispacecraft techniques, allowing them to be identified as flux ropes, whose flux content is small (approx. 22 kWb).The current density, calculated using plasma and magnetic field measurements independently, is foun…