Interaction of Mid-latitude Magnetic Conjugate Points During Geomagnetic Storm

In this study, the total electron content changes of Beijing-Learmonth, Petropavlovsk-Canberra and Bar Harbor-Palmer stations located at mid-latitude magnetic conjugate points during the storm time are combined by combining Superposed Epoch Analysis (SEA) and Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) methods. Although 4 storms that occurred in different seasons in 2015 were captured, more than 3200 storm periods corresponding to each storm were analyzed and a strong background infrastructure was provided. The obtained results showed that storms during the equinox period caused symmetric ionospheric increases between their conjugate points, while different behaviors were exhibited under solstice conditions. Significant seasonal changes were observed in the cross-conjugate coupling coefficients α ₁ /β ₁ and geomagnetic selected coefficients α ₂ /β ₂ in MLR. An asymmetric and regular structure of the magnetosphere-ionosphere transfer depending on the season was shown. The observed interhemispheric asymmetry is not fully captured by commonly used semiempirical ionosphere models, thus emphasizing products with more regional and seasonal relevance. Our findings provide new formal insights into the spatial and temporal dynamics of the magnetic conjugation points.