NASA has agreed two heliophysics missions to study the Sun and the system that controls space weather near Earth.
Together, NASA’s contribution to the Epsilon Mission High-Throughput Spectroscopic Extreme Ultraviolet Telescope, or EUVST, and the Zeeman Electrojet Imaging Explorer, or EZIE, will help us understand the sun and earth as an interconnected system.
Understanding the physics that direct solar wind and solar eruptions – including solar flares and coronal mass ejections – could one day help scientists predict these events , which will affect human technology and researchers in space.
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, is leading the Extreme Ultraviolet High-Throughput Spectroscopic Telescope, or EUVST, Epsilon Mission, also known as Solar-C EUVST Mission, along with other international partners.
Aimed for launch in 2026, EUVST is a solar telescope that will study how the solar atmosphere emits solar wind and drives an explosion of solar materials. These onions spread out from the Sun and affect the environment of space radiation throughout the solar system.
NASA’s hardware contributions to the mission include an intensive UV detector and support electronics, spectrograph components, a directional telescope, software and a slit-jaw imaging system to provide context for the spectrographic measurement. .
The budget for NASA grants to EUVST is $ 55 million. The lead investigator for NASA ‘s contribution to EUVST is Harry Warren at the U.S. marine research laboratory in Washington.
The Zeeman Electrojet Imaging Explorer, or EZIE, studies electric currents in the Earth’s atmosphere connecting aurora to the Earth’s magnetosphere – one piece of the Earth’s complex space weather system, which responds to solar activity and other factors.
The Auroral Electrojet index, or AE, is a common measure of geomagnetic activity levels, even though the details of the structure of these currents are not understood. EZIE will launch no earlier than June 2024. The total budget for the EZIE mission is $ 53.3 million.
The principal investigator for the mission is Jeng-Hwa “Sam” Yee at the Johns Hopkins University applied physics laboratory in Laurel, Maryland.
“We are delighted to add these new missions to the growing fleet of satellites exploring our Sun-Earth system using an incredible selection of unprecedented observers,” he said. Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for science at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “In addition to my commitment to selecting an advanced multi-point observatory with a focus on the auroral electrojets, I am delighted to continue the success of the Yohkoh and Hinode solar science missions with international collaboration. another with JAXA and other European partners on EUVST. ”
The EUVST mission addresses the recommendations of a final report in July 2017 delivered by the next-generation Solar Physics Mission Science Goals Team. EUVST will take complete UV spectroscopy measurements of the sun’s atmosphere at the highest level to date, allowing scientists to discover how different magnetic and plasma processes control coronary heating and energy dissipation.
“We are excited to work with our international partners to answer some of our fundamental questions about the Sun,” said Nicky Fox, director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “EUVST’s ideas will complement our existing missions to give us a fresh perspective on our star.”
EZIE is a study involving a trio of CubeSats that will study the source and changes in the auroral electrojet, an electric current circulating through the Earth’s atmosphere about 60-90 miles above the surface and expanding into the Earth’s magnetosphere.
The interaction of the magnetosphere with the solar wind tightens the solar face of the magnetosphere and pulls out the nocturnal side of the magnetosphere into what is known as the “magnetotail. ”
Auroral electrojets are generated by changes in the structure of the magnetotile. The same space weather objects that power the beautiful aurora can block radio and communication signals and utility grids on the Earth’s surface, and damage a spacecraft in orbit.
“With these new missions, we are expanding how we study the Sun, space and the Earth as an interconnected system,” said Peg Luce, deputy director of the Heliophysics Department at NASA Headquarters in and Washington. “EZIE’s use of proven instrument technology on Earth science CubeSat missions is just one example of how NASA’s science and technology development will go hand in hand across subjects. ”
Funding for these opportunity messages comes from the Heliophysics Explorers Program, managed by the Explorers Program Office at NASA ‘s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
For more information about NASA’s Heliophysics Department, visit https://www.nasa.gov/sunearth.
For more information on Heliophysics access missions, visit https://explorers.gsfc.nasa.gov/missions.html.