The team will apply a three-dimensional (3D) tomographic technique they have developed to analyze real-time heliospheric plasma observations obtained by ground-based interplanetary scintillation (IPS) instruments and the Solar Mass Ejection Imager (SMEI) instrument on the Coriolis spacecraft. This team will also use observations from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) spacecraft to determine its ambient heliospheric environment, to reconstruct the shapes of plasma structures observed remotely and in situ by STEREO, and to evaluate and refine their existing tomographic models and techniques. The Principal Investigator (PI) will continue collaborations in making IPS observations with the Solar-Terrestrial Environment Laboratory (STELab) in Japan and with the Ooty Radio Telescope in India, in anticipation of assisting the ongoing deployment of the NSF-funded Murchison Widefield Array (MWA) being constructed in Western Australia.
The PI plans to perform more complete analyses of existing IPS radio data and SMEI Thomson-scattering data that are of specific interest to the Solar, Heliospheric, and INterplanetary Environment (SHINE) community for campaign events and collaborative studies. The team will test both ground-based and space-based remote-sensing observations to determine the extent to which these can best be used to provide global 3D heliospheric density and velocity measurements. The team also plans to incorporate solar wind models that include solar wind magnetic fields into their tomographic reconstructions of solar wind velocity and density.
The analyses provided by the PI's team make visible a region between the Sun and Earth that is otherwise difficult to depict. Their tomographic model is currently available at the Community Coordinate Modeling Center at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center for "runs-on-request," allowing use by researchers worldwide. As part of this effort, the images and animations produced by the PI's 3D tomography technique will be made available via the internet as an archival data set at the University of California-San Diego. This archive will be a valuable education tool, as well as a space weather forecasting tool, for the study of the global properties of Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), co-rotating plasma structures, and solar wind interactions.
This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
