Ejection of dust from Jupiter's gossamer ring

Abstract

ONE of the most intriguing discoveries of the Ulysses mission so far has been the detection of periodic, collimated streams of high-velocity, submicrometre-sized dust particles emanating from Jupiter^1,2. To explain the Ulysses data, Horanyi et al. showed³ that electromagnetic forces within Jupiter's magnetosphere can accelerate and eject small dust particles; they proposed a model in which Io is the source of the dust, and the observed periodicity arises from a resonance between the orbital and rotational periods of Io and Jupiter respectively. Here we argue that the masses and velocities of the detected particles are better explained by an origin in Jupiter's gossamer ring. Following their ejection from the magnetosphere, the dust particles are accelerated by the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF). We find that it is the temporal evolution of the IMF which primarily determines the particle trajectories, and hence which particles reach the spacecraft. Our model explains three main features observed in the Ulysses data: fewer streams are detected before closest approach than after, the observed periodicity is closely related to the solar rotation period, and an extremely intense dust stream is detected immediately after closest approach.