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A representation of Van Allen's belts artist, showing the Earth's magnetic field lines and trajectories of charged particles trapped by them. The ELFIN twin spacecraft are shown in their inclined polar orbit, outlined in yellow. Credit: UCLA EPSS / NASA SVS
Three hundred and ten miles above the surface of our planet, the space close to Earth is in full swing. Here begin the Van Allen Belts, a pair of concentric rings of fast-moving particles and intense radiation that extends over 30,000 miles into space. For the most part, these particles are confined to this particular region, spiraling along the magnetic field lines of the Earth. But sometimes they get too close and enter our atmosphere, creating an eye-catching red aurora, but also interfering with the critical communications and GPS satellites we depend on every day.
A new CubeSat mission called "Electronic Losses and Fields Survey," or ELFIN, will study one of the processes that allow energetic electrons to escape the Van Allen belts and fall into the Earth. ELFIN is expected to be launched from Vandenburg Air Force Base in California on September 15, 2018.
When magnetic storms form in the near space of the Earth, they create waves that wave Earth's magnetic field lines, expelling the electrons from Van Allen's belts and depositing them in our atmosphere. ELFIN wants to be the first to simultaneously observe this electronic precipitation while checking the causal mechanism, by measuring the magnetic waves and the "lost" electrons that result.
Funded by NASA, the National Science Foundation and industry partners, ELFIN is a CubeSat mission. CubeSats are light and compact satellites, measured in standard units of 10 x 10 x 10 cm3, which are relatively fast to develop and come with a price tag for a fraction of the largest satellite missions. ELFIN uses two 3U CubeSats or 3 identical cubes, both the size of a bread. By using two satellites instead of one, ELFIN will be able to measure the variation of electrons precipitated in space and time. Designed, built and tested by a team of 250 UCLA students over five years, ELFIN will be the first satellite developed, managed and fully operated by UCLA. One of the main advantages of CubeSats is that they allow students to participate in all phases of satellite development, operation and operation, through a research experience and concrete development.
The ELFIN CubeSats twins. Credit: UCLA EPSS
Small satellites, including CubeSats, are playing an increasingly important role in NASA's exploration, technology demonstration, scientific research, and educational studies. These miniature satellites provide an inexpensive platform for NASA missions, including global space exploration; Observations of the earth; fundamental sciences of the Earth and space; and the development of scientific instruments on precursors such as advanced laser communications, satellite satellite communications and autonomous movement capabilities.
On launch day, ELFIN will ship as a secondary payload on a Delta II rocket with NASA's Ice, Cloud, Land Elevation Satellite-2 or ICESat-2 mission. ICESat-2 will measure the thickness of ice caps, glaciers, sea ice and other elements to document how the Earth's cryosphere (the portion of frozen groundwater) is changing over time.
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