Ray-tracing simulations of whistler-mode wave propagation in different rescaled dipole magnetic fields

Kinetic simulation is a powerful tool to study the excitation and propagation of whistler-mode waves in the Earth’s inner magnetosphere. This method typically applies a scaled-down dipole magnetic field to save computational time. However, it remains unknown whether whistler wave propagation in the scaled-down dipole field is consistent with that in the realistic dipole field. In this work, we develop a ray-tracing code with a scalable dipole magnetic field to address this concern. The simulation results show that parallel whistler waves at different frequencies gradually become oblique after leaving the equator and propagate in different raypaths in a dipole magnetic field. During their propagation, the higher frequency waves tend to have larger wave normal angles at the same latitude. Compared with the wave propagation in a realistic dipole field, the wave raypath and wave normal remain the same, whereas the wave amplification or attenuation is smaller because of the shorter propagation time in a scaled-down dipole field. Our study provides significant guidance for kinetic simulations of whistler-mode waves.