Bulletin of the American Physical Society
Mid-Atlantic Section Meeting 2021
Volume 66, Number 18
Friday–Sunday, December 3–5, 2021; Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey
Session H02: General Contributions in Solar-Terrestrial Physics |
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Chair: Bea Gallardo-Lacourt, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Room: 201B |
Sunday, December 5, 2021 11:15AM - 11:51AM |
H02.00001: Numerical Modeling of Space and Laboratory Plasmas Invited Speaker: Chuanfei Dong In the past decades, plasma physics has witnessed a tremendous surge. Research in this area now encompasses a wide spectrum of fields ranging from plasma astrophysics to heliophysics, and laboratory plasma physics. One of the primary objectives of plasma physics is to understand the behavior of diverse plasmas subjected to different external conditions, e.g., how planetary plasmas respond to magnetized stellar winds, and how laboratory plasmas respond to high-power, short-pulsed lasers. The former has a major societal impact in the context of space weather forecasts and human space exploration, while the latter can facilitate our understanding of extreme plasma astrophysics. In order to address these questions of different scales, a broad array of numerical models with different physics capabilities, such as magnetohydrodynamic (MHD), multi-moment, test particle, and particle-in-cell methods, will be necessary. In this presentation, I will first highlight several similarities and differences between space and laboratory plasma problems. I will subsequently cover research topics including, but not limited to, magnetized stellar wind interactions with planets in our solar system and beyond, laser-driven magnetic reconnection, and fundamental plasma physics problems such as the interplay between magnetohydrodynamic turbulence and magnetic reconnection. [Preview Abstract] |
Sunday, December 5, 2021 11:51AM - 12:27PM |
H02.00002: The ionosphere-thermosphere system's response to a total solar eclipse: looking forward to December 4, 2021 Invited Speaker: Gareth Perry The topic of this presentation will be the upcoming December 4, 2021 total solar eclipse and planned experiments to study the eclipse's effects on the ionosphere-thermosphere (IT) system. A total solar eclipse offers a unique opportunity to study the impulse response of the coupled IT system as the relatively sudden onset of the obscuration of the solar disc is comparable to a delta-function impulse acting on the system. Starting at 07:00:01 UT on December 4, 2021, just west of the South Georgia and South Sandwich Islands in the South Atlantic Ocean, the umbra of the eclipse will begin its southerly and westerly journey, traverse the Weddell Sea, Ronne Ice Shelf, and Palmer Land, and finish at the day/night terminator in the Bellingshausen Sea at approximately 08:06:29 UT. The remoteness of this eclipse's path makes it difficult to study with ground-based instruments; however, the path of totality is close to several populated scientific installations in Antarctica, including McMurdo Station, allowing for some opportunity to study the event from the ground. Several spacecraft, including CASSIOPE, the Canadian low-Earth orbit satellite carrying the Enhanced Polar Outflow Probe (e-POP), will be well positioned to study the eclipse. The probe will cross the umbral path within 30 minutes of totality, at approximately 800 km altitude. In preparation for the December eclipse, we will discuss past eclipse studies, focusing on the IT system's response to each event, including results from the 2017 ``Great American Eclipse'', which is arguably one of the most heavily studied eclipses from an IT perspective. We will outline outstanding questions concerning the effects of an eclipse on the IT system which remain unresolved, including whether travelling ionospheric disturbances (TIDs) are a byproduct of an eclipse. These outstanding questions form the foundation of our upcoming e-POP Antarctica Eclipse Campaign, which is scheduled to commence in mid-November 2021. We will provide details of the e-POP campaign as well as other international efforts underway to observe the eclipse, despite the complexity of instrument deployment during the COVID-19 pandemic. [Preview Abstract] |
Sunday, December 5, 2021 12:27PM - 12:39PM |
H02.00003: Climatology of Traveling Ionospheric Disturbances Observed by HamSCI Amateur Radio. Diego Sanchez, Nathaniel Frissell, Gareth Perry, William Engelke, Anthea Coster, Philip Erickson, Michael Ruohoniemi, Joseph Baker, Lynn Harvey, Carl Luetzelschwab Traveling Ionospheric Disturbances (TIDs) are propagating variations in ionospheric electron densities that affect radio communications and can help with understanding energy transport throughout the coupled magnetosphere-ionosphere-neutral atmosphere system. Large scale TIDs (LSTIDs) have periods of 30 - 180 min, horizontal phase velocities of 100 -- 250 m/s, and horizontal wavelengths of 1000 km or greater. TIDs create concavities in the ionospheric electron density profile that move horizontally with the TID and cause skip-distance focusing effects for high frequency (HF, 3-30 MHz) radio signals. This phenomenon is manifest as quasi-periodic variations in contact ranges in HF amateur radio communication reports recorded by automated monitoring systems such as the Weak Signal Propagation Reporting Network (WSPRNet) and the Reverse Beacon Network (RBN). In this study, members of the Ham Radio Science Citizen Investigation (HamSCI) present a climatology of LSTID activity. Results will be organized as a function observation frequency and longitudinal sector season. Connections to geospacer and neutral atmospheric sources are also explored. [Preview Abstract] |
Sunday, December 5, 2021 12:39PM - 12:51PM |
H02.00004: Abnormalities in the Low-Latitude Dayside Ionosphere. Sovit Khadka, Andrew Gerrard The equatorial electrojet (EEJ) and equatorial ionization anomaly (EIA) are the most prominent low-latitude ionospheric phenomena during daytime. The eastward electric field is the driving force for the EEJ and upward E\texttimes B plasma drift that ultimately forms the EIA via the equatorial plasma fountain during daytime at the magnetic equator. In the low-latitude ionosphere, the upward E\texttimes B drift velocity plays an important role in the ionospheric plasma distributions. In general, the strength, shape, amplitude, and latitudinal width of the EIAs are affected by the eastward electric field associated with the EEJ and neutral winds. Here we discuss the abnormal features of EEJ and EIA with quantitative evidence using ground-based observations. [Preview Abstract] |
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