DAYSIDE MOVING AURORAL FORMS AND BURSTY PROTON AURORAL EVENTS IN RELATION TO PARTICLE BOUNDARIES OBSERVED BY NOAA-12

This paper consider two sequences of moving auroral forms that were ob served in the early postnoon sector above Svalbard. The series of even ts observed on January 12, 1992, moved westward (noonward) under unkno wn IMF conditions. The events observed on December 17, 1992, moved eas tward while interplanetary magnetic field B-Y was strongly negative. T he auroral luminosity for these events was dominated by the 630.0-nm e mission line but correlated in Space and time with subvisual H-B inten sifications. NOAA 12 particle characteristics relate the moving aurora l forms to low-latitude boundary layer precipitation located poleward of the electron trapping boundary, i.e., on open magnetic field lines. The auroral activity and associated particle signatures are both attr ibuted to magnetopause reconnection. Since magnetic reconnection is th e only known mechanism capable of bulk injecting magnetosheath ions an d electrons on the dayside, we suggest that simultaneous occurrence of proton and electron auroral activity is a unique footprint of dayside magnetic reconnection.