The PI proposes to help establish a full tenure-track faculty position in solar physics in the Department of Planetary Sciences and the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (DPS/LPL) at the University of Arizona, where a research group working in the general areas of theoretical heliospheric plasma physics and energetic-particle physics already exists. The goal is to integrate solar physics as an academic and research discipline into the University. This initiative will explicitly include close cooperation and collaboration with the National Solar Observatory staff (two of whom are co-investigators), to take advantage of NSO personnel and facilities already in place. The intent is to attract an individual faculty member of the highest quality and to make solar physics a vibrant and important component of the University, as well as to benefit the broader solar physics community.
The proposed addition to the DPS/LPL faculty will extend the research and teaching of the Department into new areas, while at the same time building on existing strengths. It is expected that the combination of solar physics with heliospheric and planetary science will produce synergies with areas such as atmospheric sciences, Earth sciences, and cosmochemistry at the University. The addition of solar physics to the educational program of the University of Arizona will have direct effects. The world-class research and teaching at the University and the proximity of the NSO will attract excellent students to do graduate work in solar physics. Significant numbers of undergraduate students will be introduced to the current state of our knowledge of the Sun. The University will initiate a program of summer schools, conferences, and outreach programs in solar physics, which will bring the program to the attention of the broader public and science community. The activity will be located in the culturally diverse Southwest of the United States, where the University will reach out to students in a wide variety of ethnic groups and cultures, while encouraging them to consider science education and research as a career.
Dr. Rogers came to LPL in 2008 and has since integrated well into the department. She has served on numerous committees, done numerous outreach activities, advised graduate students, taught several classes and expanded her research program. From this perspective the NSF initiative to place faculty members in academic departments has been successful. During this time Dr. Rogers research has continued to focus on angular momentum transport in the solar interior. In particular, Dr. Rogers has worked on understanding the tachocline and uniform rotation of the solar radiative interior. To this end, Dr. Roger has studied the propagation, dissipation and transport by internal gravity waves (Rogers et al. 2008), the interaction of those waves with a magnetic field (Rogers & MacGregor 2010,2011, MacGregor and Rogers 2011). In addition she has studied the role of meridional circulation and magnetic field play in confining the tachocline and enforcing uniform rotation (Rogers 2011a,b). With regard to internal gravity waves Rogers found that they alone can not explain the uniform rotation of the solar radiative interior, but they could help coupling the convective and radiative regions on short timescales, while in conjunction the magnetic field could force uniform rotation. While the meridional circulation itself is not able to confine the field, the dynamics of convection interacting with the stiff stratification of the radiation zone could cause secondary dynamics which limit the thickness of the solar tachocline. With a magnetic field in the interior, uniform rotation can be enforced without the spreading of differential rotation. However, these numerical simulations were carried out in axisymmetry and hence, neglect some aspects of turbulent transport. She, in collaboration with several others (Glatzmaier, Brummell, Garaud) are working on extending these simulations to 3D in order to better understand the true dynamics of the solar tachocline and radiative region. More recently, Dr. Rogers, along with her graduate student Jess Vriesema and Frank Hill are working on determining the likelihood of observing g-modes from the center of the Sun. To do this, Vriesema is using data from Rogers’ numerical simulations to look at the correlation of waves beneath and above the convection zone, in order to determine the amplitudes and mostly likely wavelengths and frequencies that could be observed. Dr. Rogers has also been applying her expertise in computational hydrodynamics and MHD to problems in extrasolar planets and other stars. She is collaborating with another member of the faculty, Adam Showman, and advising another graduate student on MHD in hot Jupiters.
