Abstract
The magnetopause is the principal boundary dividing the magnetic field of the solar origin from the region of space that is occupied by the Earth's magnetic field. The shape and location of this boundary varies in response to upstream driving as well as to the internal state of the magnetosphere.
Since solar wind mass and momentum entering the magnetosphere should cross the magnetopause, the processes at this boundary have been the subject of an intensive research over the course of many years. One direction in these investigations is the development of models of the magnetopause shape and location and about two dozen of them were published within past four decades.
The models have different ranges of validity, include one or more upstream drivers, and use various functional forms to describe the magnetopause shape and its response to these drivers. The main task of this paper is to compare predictions of models with a large set of magnetopause crossings and to identify principal limits of predictability.
This comparison shows that, in spite of the natural limitations connected with the determination of upstream conditions, there is space for the further improvement of our ability to predict the magnetopause location. Consequently, we analyze the factors that would be included into a future model.