Disentangling Photoelectrons and Penetrating Solar Wind Electrons in the Dayside Martian Upper Atmosphere

Abstract

AbstractIn situ produced photoelectrons and precipitating solar wind electrons are two distinct hot electron populations in the dayside Martian upper atmosphere. While each population has been known for decades, its relative contribution to the measured hot electron flux has not been adequately characterized up to now. In this study, we implement a two‐stream kinetic model to compute the hot electron flux for a open magnetic field configuration. By comparing model results to realistic data acquired by the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission, we show that the electron fluxes predicted by the pure photoelectron model are enormously underestimated, especially in the direction toward Mars, but the measurements can be adequately reproduced once solar wind electron precipitation is taken into account. Such a precipitation plays a crucial role above 180 km, not only for hot electrons at all energies that move toward Mars but also for electrons above 1,000 eV that move away from Mars due to the backscattering of precipitating electrons. In contrast, the hot electron population is predicted to be mostly composed of photoelectrons below 180 km. The significance of precipitating solar wind electrons is also evaluated, revealing an appreciable impact on the structure of the dayside Martian upper atmosphere at high altitudes, where electron impact ionization is enhanced by a factor of 7 and cold electron heating enhanced by a factor of 4.