›Conference: Fundamental Physical Processes in Solar-Terrestrial Research and Their Relevance to Planetary Physics 2017

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The main theme of this conference is to focus on understanding the variability of space plasma phenomena, encompassing those related to the Sun and all planets within our solar system.

Variability of space plasma environment is the norm rather than the exception. The cause of this variability is still under active research. In the interplanetary medium, plasma parameters change continually, permeated by plasma waves, shocks, turbulence, co-rotating interaction regions, and coronal mass ejections that agitate the environment. Such disturbances in the solar wind can lead to geomagnetic storms, which do not seem to produce relativistic electrons in the radiation belt according to their intensity. The ionosphere has variability that impacts severely radio communications. Its outflows during geomagnetic active periods can modify dramatically the magnetospheric population and physical processes within.

In other planets, plasma sources from their moons play a similar role in influencing magnetospheric environment and processes much like that of the Earth's ionospheric plasma source. Information exchange on magnetospheric research between Earth and other planets can provide valuable insights into universal processes occurring throughout our solar system. Understanding and predicting the variability of space plasma phenomena requires knowledge of not only individual physical processes or magnetospheric phenomena but also the interplay between them in a system-wide approach.