ASTR 4800: Space Science -Practice & Policy

• Today’s Topic: The NASA Heliophysics Roadmap.

• Next Class: Space Radiation Hazards with Prof. Dan Baker.

• Reading: Executive Summary of Severe Space Weather Events on class website.

• Final paper due on December 9.

On Being the NASA Administrator• 10 page essay that describes your vision of NASA if you

were selected as NASA’s Administrator. It must be realistic but you should be visionary!

• Present vision and goals statements for your version of NASA.

• Present a budget table for next fiscal year and 4 years beyond it. Assume President Obama & Congress will increase NASA’s funding by no more than a few percent over the next 5 years.

• Present a strategy on how you will sell your budget and plans to the Congress & the U.S. taxpayer.

• Integrate all that you have learned this semester about the history of NASA, international programs, human and robotic space exploration, aeronautics, space policy, etc.

• Include appropriate references, especially to any quotations.

Space in the News: Space and its benefits for citizens and society: A top

priority for EuropeJeramy Lewis

Hemicycle of the European parliament during theConference on Space Policy for society and citizens.

The HeliophysicsRoadmap

Keita Linden

What is Heliophysics?

Heliophysics is a term coined by NASA to describe the study of the sun and what the sun interacts with.

This includes the Sun’s heliosphere, planetary atmospheres and magnetospheres, the solar corona, as well as the interstellar medium.

Question

How does the Sun effect us here on planet Earth?

The Solar Storm of 1859

September 1-2, was the largest recorded geomagnetic storm. Telegraphs were fried all over North America and Europe.

Aurorae were seen all around the world including the Rocky Mountains!

Coronal Mass Ejection

Purpose of the roadmap

Frontiers◦ Most of our solar system consists of plasma.

More complex than other states of matter—electric and magnetic fields accelerate particles, sometimes to high energies.

◦ Develop a scientific understanding of fundamental properties that control our environment.

Home in Space◦ Better understanding of our place in the solar system◦ Develop our knowledge of what the space environment has on our planet,

technology, and human kind.

Safeguard our Journey of Exploration◦ Develop a “space weather forecast” to safeguard human exploration to

extraterrestrial places.

Do you think that proposing a science queue rather than a general mission queue promotes a better system for strategic thinking?

Science: Two Science Queues

Solar Terrestrial Probes (STP)◦ Origins of Near Earth Plasma (ONEP)

Understand the origin and transport of plasma from its source to the magnetosphere and solar wind.

◦ Solar Energetic Particle Acceleration and Transport (SEPAT) Understand how and where solar eruptions accelerate energetic particles

that reach Earth.◦ Ion-Neutral Coupling in the Atmosphere (INCA)

Understand how neutral winds cause variations in the ionosphere (What drives the electric fields and chemical reactions that control this part of the atmosphere?)

Living With a Star (LWS)◦ Climate Impacts of Space Radiation (CIRS)

Understand our atmosphere’s response to aurorae, radiation belt, and solar energetic particles, and its effects on our ozone.

◦ Dynamic Geospace Coupling (DGC) Understand how Earth’s magnetic field provides energy for the ionosphere-

magnetosphere system.◦ Heliospheric Magnetics (Hmag)

Understand how magnetism affects Earth.

Goals for STP

Understand How the sun keeps its magnetic field and how magnetic energy is converted into kinetic energy.

Understand how electric and magnetic fields effect our home in space.

STP Science Questions Targeted by Missions

How does the geometry of the magnetic field lines change?

How is the solar wind accelerated?

Is there anything external causing the sun to act up?

What causes disturbances in the sun?

Should there be a priority to these questions? Which question is most important?

Goals for LWS

Understand how the Sun varies and what the causes are.

Understand how the Earth and planetary system respond to the Sun.

Understand how and in what ways harsh space environments affect human and robotic exploration.

Questions Targeted by LWS

How are Plasmas and charged particles heated and accelerated?

How is the solar wind accelerated? What causes these disturbances? What is the magnetic structure of the Sun-heliosphere

system? How does the solar wind propagate and evolve through the

solar system? What controls the behavior of planetary magnetospheres? How do long-term variations in solar energy output affect

Earth’s climate? Heliophysics does not have a Decadal Survey, does this

roadmap fulfill the Decadal Survey’s role?

Proposed Missions

Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission (MMS)

Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) Radiation Belt Storm Probes (RBSP) Solar Orbiter (SO) Solar Probe Plus (SP+)

Supporting Flight Elements

• Space Environment Testbeds(SET)

• The Balloon Arrar for RBSP Relativistic Electron Losses (BARREL)

Main Missions

MMS: Magnetospheric MultiscaleMission

Uses Earth’s Magnetosphere as a laboratory to study how magnetic fields rearrange themselves.

This is a process that converts magnetic energy into heat and kinetic energy.

Understand how this process accelerates particles.

Understand “space weather.” A mission that fulfills targets proposed by

the STP science queue.

SDO: Solar Dynamics Observatory

Understand the solar variations and how it effects us here on Earth.

Understand the origin of Solar Wind. Study how Solar activity is created and

how space weather emerges as a product of that activity.

Will make measurements of the interior of the sun, the sun’s magnetic field, the hot plasma of the solar corona, and determines what drives solar activity.

Fulfills Questions in Living with a Star Science Queue.

RBSP: Radiation Belt Storm Probes

Provide insight into the phenomenon of particle acceleration within the radiation belts.

Give scientists the data they need to make predictions of changes in this region of space.

Two spacecraft will orbit the Earth and measure the particles, magnetic and electric fields, and waves that fill space.

Helps understand particle acceleration mechanisms and how they operate in both space and time.

Part of LWS.

SO: Solar Orbiter

SO will orbit within 1/5 of the Earth’s distance from the Sun.

Close up study of our Sun and inner heliosphere.

Details of the Sun’s atmosphere. Find links between the Sun’s atmosphere

and solar activity. Study Polar Regions LWS mission NASA’s collaboration with ESA

SP+: Solar Probe Plus

Understand why the solar corona is so much hotter than the photosphere and how the solar wind is accelerated.

Will approach as close as nine solar radii from the surface.

Directly probes solar atmosphere. LWS mission

Do any of these missions seem redundant? Is our money put to good use?

Space Environment Testbeds and the Balloon Array for RBSP Relativistic Electron Losses

SET project will Characterize the space environment’s impact on hardware performance in space.

Piggyback payload on the U.S. Air Force Deployable Structures Experiment (DSX).

BARREL is a balloon based mission of opportunity to argue the measurements of the RBSP mission.

Two campaigns of five to eight long duration balloons aloft simultaneously over a 1-month period.

Provides measurements of the spatial extent of relativistic electro precipitation and to allow estimates of total electron loss from the radiation belts.

Conjugate with RBSP spacecraft so that comparison is possible between them.