Lithosphere – Ionosphere – Magnetosphere Coupling

THE MILC MODEL

In the frame of the CSES-Limadou collaboration, a Magnetospheric-Ionospheric-Lithospheric Coupling (M.I.L.C.) analytical model (https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/12/20/3299) has been developed in order to give a causal explanation to the atmospheric, ionospheric and magnetospheric observations potentially connected to earthquake occurrence.

MILC model is based on three causal steps (see Figure 4):

    1. An AGW is generated around the EE, propagating through the atmosphere;
    2. The AGW interacts mechanically with the ionosphere creating a local instability in the plasma distribution through a pressure gradient. Such plasma variation put the ionosphere into “meta-stable” state, giving rise, in the E-layer, to a local non-stationary electric current. This, in turn, generates an electromagnetic (EM) wave.
    3. The interaction of such EM wave with the magnetospheric field causes a change in the eigenfrequency of the field line, whose ionospheric footprint is located over the radial projection of the EE.

The model has been successfully applied to more than 10 earthquakes showing its capability to give robust previsions of possible atmospheric, ionospheric and magnetospheric signals associated to seismic activity.

Figure 1: Cartoon describing the basic components of the proposed M.I.L.C. model