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Early in the morning of November 7, 2018, NASA launches the Ionospheric Explorer Explorer, or ICON, a spacecraft that will explore the dynamic region where Earth and space meet: the ionosphere.
Covering the farthest reaches of the earth's atmosphere and at the very beginning of space, the ionosphere expands to about 50 to 400 miles above the surface. Solar radiation cooks fine gases until they lose an electron (or two or three), creating a sea of electrically charged ions and electrons. Neither entirely from the Earth nor from space, the ionosphere reacts to both the winds and the weather that it makes from the lower atmosphere and to the solar energy that flows from the earth. at the top, constantly changing to form conditions that we call the space weather.
"After years of work, I am delighted to go into orbit and light the spacecraft, to open all the doors of our instruments," said Thomas Immel, ICON Senior Researcher at the University of California. California to Berkeley. "ICON has an incredible scientific capacity, I look forward to surprising results and finally seeing the world through his eyes."
Regarding the space, the ionosphere is as close to home as possible. Its constant changes can affect astronauts, satellites and much of the communication signals that modern society supports. Scientists want to understand these changes so that we can better predict them and protect our interests in space.
The space may seem empty, but the ionosphere is full of electrically charged gas, solar radiation, and electric and magnetic fields. Turbulence in this sea of charged particles can result in disturbances that interfere with the satellites in orbit or the communication and navigation signals used, for example, to guide aircraft, ships and autonomous cars.
Depending on the energy absorbed by the sun, the ionosphere grows and contracts. For this reason, scientists have long thought that this part of space was affected only by what happens in the space above.
But over the past decade, more and more evidence has shown that the region is much more variable than we can explain with solar activity alone. The content of the ionosphere is not uniformly distributed: dense plates of its charged gases, called plasma, are scattered. Researchers have come to associate these problems with global weather conditions: large-scale events, such as several hurricanes simultaneously rushing into the ocean, or changes in cloud formation over tropical forests.
Although the Sun provides the energy that governs weather conditions on Earth, day-to-day weather conditions depend on something very different: differences in temperature and humidity, interactions between oceans and highlands and regions. and low atmospheric pressure. Nevertheless, the scientists were surprised to discover that Earth time and the Sun manage to meet in the center – at the level of the ionosphere – in struggle for control.
High winds blowing very high over the Earth's surface carry energy around the globe and can indirectly alter the ionosphere by pushing around charged particles in the upper atmosphere. This motion creates an electric field that guides the behavior of particles in the electrically charged ionosphere.
Part of the reason why the ionosphere has remained so mysterious so far is that the region is hard to observe. Too high for scientific balloons and too low for satellites, the low ionosphere in particular – where Earth and space are most closely connected – has escaped most of the technologies used by researchers to study space near Earth. But ICON is particularly well equipped to investigate the region.
"We had the smoking gun – which indicates that terrestrial and space weather conditions are related – but we lack real observations in the area where these changes are taking place," said Scott England, scientist of the ICON project at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. "ICON has all the tools to see the drivers and their effects in the system."
In a low Earth orbit, ICON will explore these connections by tracking a glimmer of air, a whim of the upper atmosphere of our planet. It refers to the light that shines from the ionosphere, enveloping the Earth in a tenuous bubble of red, green, and yellow. Airglow is created by a similar process that causes the aurora: the gas is excited and emits light. Although the aurora borealis is generally confined to extreme northern and southern latitudes, light rays are constantly shining throughout the world and are much weaker.
"It's amazing to see our atmosphere shine like that, but in addition, it gives us a direct ability to observe the key parameters we need to study the connection between the neutral atmosphere and the ionosphere, "said Immel.
Different atmospheric gases shine in certain colors and at certain altitudes. Scientists can thus use airglow to probe the different layers of the atmosphere, by gleaning information such as density, temperature and composition. In addition, the natural glow of the Earth helps scientists track movements within the same ionosphere: as high-altitude winds sweep the region, moving its contents, the low light of the Airglow transforms itself by tracing global trends.
"I can not wait to see what airglow will look like from ICON's point of view," Immel said.
The ICON 90-minute launch window will open at 7:00 am EST on November 7, 2018. ICON will launch on a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket, taken away by the Stargazer L-1011 aircraft which takes off from Cape Canaveral Air Base. in Florida. The L-1011 carries the rocket about 40,000 feet above the ocean, where it is released and falls for five seconds in free fall before igniting its first-stage rocket engine. The Stargazer exit is scheduled for 3:05 am EST. The spacecraft unfolds about 11 minutes after the fall of Pegasus.
ICON will join another ionospheric mission, GOLD, which means "Observations on the global limb and disk scale," launched in January 2018. While ICON is flying just 357 miles above the Earth, it will capture Close-up images of the region, GOLD in geostationary is orbiting 22,000 miles above the Western Hemisphere, where it specializes in global-scale images of the ionosphere and the high atmosphere. Where ICON takes close-ups, GOLD captures landscapes.
Together, these missions will provide the most complete ionospheric observations we have ever had – data difficult to obtain from the Earth, where we can only measure small fractions of the region at a time – to better understand the interaction of our planet with space. .
"It's a really wonderful time to study heliophysics," said Nicola Fox, director of the heliophysics division of NASA in Washington. "We have just launched Parker Solar Probe earlier this year, which will give us the first insight into what's driving the solar wind, and now with ICON joining our fleet of heliophysical systems, we'll have incredibly detailed measurements of the response from The ionosphere to solar pilots is a great opportunity to study the whole system response. "
NASA's heliophysics missions study a vast interconnected system from the Sun to the Earth's surrounding space and other planets, as well as to the farthest boundaries of the Sun's continuous flow of solar wind. ICON observations will provide vital information about connecting the Earth's atmosphere to this complex and dynamic system.
ICON is a mission of the Explorer class. NASA Goddard manages the NASA heliophysics division explorers' program at the Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The UC Space Science Laboratory in Berkeley developed and operated the ICON mission and built the EUV and FUV imagers. The Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC, developed the MIGHTI instrument, the University of Texas at Dallas developed the IVM technology, and the ICON spacecraft and Pegasus launcher were built by Northrop Grumman at Dulles , in Virginia.
NASA's launch coverage begins at 7:45 am EST on November 7, 2018. Follow NASA's launch coverage on TV here.
Related Links
Ionospheric Connection Explorer, or ICON,
Earth Observation News – Suppiliers, Technology and Applications
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GRACE-FO resumes data collection
Pasadena CA (JPL) November 5, 2018
The GRACE-FO mission (gravity recovery and climate monitoring) has resumed the collection of scientific-quality data and planned verifications in orbit after the successful transition to an emergency microwave system ( IWM) spaceship.
The on-orbit checks include calibrations and other system tests, and are expected to continue until January, when GRACE-FO will enter the scientific phase of its mission.
"The new unit is working as expected," said … read more
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