Relationship between magnetic activity in the polar cap and atmospheric processes in the winter Antarctica

The paper demonstrates the close relationships between the polar cap magnetic activity, which is characterized by PC index (Troshichev et al., 1988, 2006) and some atmospheric phenomena typical of the winter Antarctica, such as enhancement of cloudiness, sudden warmings of the ground atmosphere in near-pole area, and formation of anomalous wind regimes above Antarctica. It was shown previously (Troshichev et al., 2004, 2008; Troshichev and Janzhura, 2004;) that these atmospheric phenomena are controlled by variations of the geoeffective interplanetary electric field impacting the Earth's magnetosphere. On the other hand, the polar cap magnetic activity is also determined by the interplanetary electric field influence through the field-aligned magnetospheric currents and electric field in the polar cap ionosphere. The results imply that the PC index, available online at http://www.aari.nw.ru from the near-pole station Vostok, can be used to monitor the anomalous atmospheric processes in winter Antarctica.