[SPA] SPA SECTION NEWSLETTER, Volume XXVI, Issue 67

[Newsletter Editor]

AMERICAN GEOPHYSICAL UNION
SPA SECTION NEWSLETTER
Volume XXVI, Issue 67
Dec.02,2019

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Table of Contents

1. Mikhail Verigin: 1948 - 2019

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Mikhail Verigin: 1948 - 2019

From: Galina Kotova (kotova at iki.rssi.ru)

Mikhail I. Verigin, leading scientist and the head of the Laboratory for Interplanetary and Near-Planetary Plasma Studies of Space Plasma Physics Department in Space Research Institute of RAS (IKI RAS), passed away on November 29, 2019 in Moscow.

Mikhail (Misha) Verigin joined this team led by K.I. Gringauz in 1971 after graduation from the Moscow Physical-Technical Institute. Later in 1988 he was elected to be the head of the laboratory replacing professor K.I. Gringauz. 

All the time M.I. Verigin was mainly engaged into processing and analyzing the spacecraft data, beginning from the fist Prognoz’es, Mars 2, 3, 5 and Venera 9-10. Then he analyzed the data from VEGA 1 and 2, Phobos 2 and Interball missions. Misha was excellent in processing; he knew the experiment thoroughly and always found the easiest and most correct way to process data and obtain physical results. He always proposed new ideas, an interesting and competent interpretation of data received from space. Excellent theoretical training allowed Misha to draw the right conclusions about processes in the near-planetary space based on very limited measurements.

He participated in obtaining the following results:

- Based on the data of the spacecraft Venus 9 and 10, the ionization source of the nighttime ionosphere of Venus was discovered and it was presumed that the available models of the Venusian nighttime atmosphere overestimated the neutral density by about two orders of magnitude. Later this was confirmed by PVO measurements.
- The dependence of the solar wind parameters on the distance to the interplanetary current sheet has been experimentally investigated.
- A previously unknown boundary was detected in the near-cometary plasma – the cometopause.
- A plasma sheet consisting of heavy ions was found in the magnetotail of Mars, the rate of loss of the Martian atmosphere through this formation was estimated.
- The solar wind deceleration detected upstream of the Martian bow shock by Phobos 2, was explained by the mass loading of the solar wind flow by ions originating from the hot oxygen-hydrogen corona of Mars. It was supposed that the density of the hot corona might be 3 times higher than the estimations of the “extreme” models. This was confirmed by MAVEN measurements later.
- A quantitative model was developed for the size and shape variations of the combined Martian magnetosphere and the effect of the local Martian crust magnetization on the position of the magnetotail boundary was revealed.
- An analytical solution was obtained for the asymptotic downstream slope of planetary bow shocks applicable for any sonic and Alfvenic Mach numbers. 
- The effects of the approach of the bow shock to the Earth with decreasing Alfvenic Mach number and its asymmetry in the terminator plane for flows with anisotropic Friedrichs diagrams were found.

This is not the complete list, of course.

Misha Verigin was a sensitive and delicate team leader, who managed to maintain the traditions and spirit of the laboratory of K.I. Gringauz. He was energetic, had high authority among the colleagues of our international cooperation, and at the same time remained a very modest and responsive person, a good friend.

It’s hard for us to survive such a loss.

RIP


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