Origin and triggers of the 1-hour electron pulsations in the Saturnian system

Phenomena displaying a periodicity of around one hour have been frequently observed in Saturn's magnetosphere during the Cassini era. In particular, flux of energetic electrons can exhibit 1-hour quasi-periodic pulsations. While these pulsations have been well characterized, their origin and the processes triggering them remained uncertain at the end of the Cassini mission. Using long imaging sequences of the auroral emissions at Saturn, we report the first direct observational evidence that the 1-hour periodicities arise from a global 1-hour oscillation of the Kronian magnetosphere. This natural oscillation acts independently of the local magnetospheric conditions and can have multiple triggering processes. Many 1-hour quasi-periodic electrons were encountered close to the magnetopause, suggesting that magnetopause processes could trigger them, such as magnetic reconnection and Kelvin-Helmholtz (KH) instabilities. We now report simultaneous presence of KH instabilities and 1-hour electron pulsations, supporting this scenario. Pulsed electrons are also encountered much deeper in the magnetosphere and may originate from reconnection in the magnetodisk, on both the day and night sides of the magnetosphere.