As per the Wednesday X1.6 Flare, we expect the CME impact on Earth at ~14 UT Friday. Following experiments are in our task list (provided acceptance by EISCAT):
1. EISCAT ESR (Svalbard): will start up in the morning - run at least till midnight. https://www.eiscat.se/raw/rtg/gup.cgi?E
2. EISCAT Mainland - provided maintenance service completed and HQ acceptance:
a) VHF MANDA D-region experiment, vertical, USRP sampling, EISCAT recording
b) UHF BELLA F-region experiment, field-aligned, USRP sampling, EISCAT recording
3. KAIRA Riometry
4. FMI TomoScand ionospheric tomography (with COSMOS 2414 Satellite flyby ~14 UT over Tromsø + other viable flybys)
Thursday, 11 September 2014
Auringon massapurkaukset matkalla kohti maata
Aurinko on lähettänyt viime aikoina revontulibongareiden iloksi kaksi voimakasta hiukkaspurkausta kohti maata (ks. animaatio täältä). Jälkimmäisen purkauksen laajenemisnopeudeksi on arvioitu jopa 3750 km/s, eli se lähes saavuttaa hitaamman edeltäjänsä maan etäisyydellä auringosta.
Ensimmäinen tömpsäyksen ennustetaan saapuvan maahan tänään, n. kello 23 paikallista aikaa. Täydellistä! Seuraavaa odotetaan huomispäiväksi kello 16 Suomen aikaa, eli perjantai-iltana revontulia kannattaa olla valppaana bongaamaan heti ns. hämärän rajamailla...
Toivotaan pilvetöntä taivasta. Ensi yön ennuste ei näytä kovin hyvältä, mutta perjantai jo paremmalta.
Sodankylän geofysiikan observatorion koko taivaan kuvaavia revontulikameroita voi seurata pimeän aikaan reaaliajassa täältä.
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| Lähde: http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/wsa-enlil/ |
Toivotaan pilvetöntä taivasta. Ensi yön ennuste ei näytä kovin hyvältä, mutta perjantai jo paremmalta.
Sodankylän geofysiikan observatorion koko taivaan kuvaavia revontulikameroita voi seurata pimeän aikaan reaaliajassa täältä.
Wednesday, 10 September 2014
Revontulia luvassa!
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| Lähde: http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/ |
Tässä on kuitenkin pari muuttujaa. Hiukkastuulen mukanaan kuljettama magneettikenttä saisi mielellään olla maan magneettikentälle vastakkaissuuntainen. Reaaliajassa tätä pääsee pääsee jännäämään suoraan satelliitista: punaisella piirretyn Bz-käyrän soisi siis olevan negatiivinen, jotta auringosta tulevat varatut hiukkaset pääsisivät tunkeutumaan maan magnetosfääriin aiheuttamaan revontulia.
Toinen mutta matkassa on tietysti mahdollinen pilvisyys, mutta juuri nyt ennuste ei näytä ihan toivottomalta sekään.
Eli peukut pystyyn ja seurataan tilannetta!
Tuesday, 9 September 2014
Magnetic mapping of the SGO measurements
In geophysics, a widely used concept "L-shell" describes how some given location on the ground maps to the magnetosphere along the magnetic field line. Starting from any given location, and following its magnetic field up to the equator plane of the Earth's magnetosphere, the L-value is the distance to that point in Earth's radii (Wikipedia).
Aeronomy research at the SGO is focused on the effects of the energetic particle precipitation from the magnetosphere to the atmosphere. Our long-term ground based instruments (see the map below), such as riometers and pulsation magnetometers, are ideally located across the most interesting L-shells, covering Van Allen Radiation Belts (L=1.5-2.5 and 4-6), auroral oval (L~6) and even the polar cap (L>10).
Another perspective is to look at the "magnetic conjugate points", i.e., to follow the magnetic field lines all the way down to the ground at the opposite magnetic hemisphere. Unfortunately, our stations mainly map to the Indian sea, making it practically impossible to study exactly the same magnetospheric field-line from two locations. However, there is one extremely close magnetic field linkage between "our" instrumentation at Svalbard, including the EISCAT radar, and the Australian Antarctic research station Davis with wealth of relevant geophysical instrumentation. This linkage must be studied more carefully in the near future ...
Aeronomy research at the SGO is focused on the effects of the energetic particle precipitation from the magnetosphere to the atmosphere. Our long-term ground based instruments (see the map below), such as riometers and pulsation magnetometers, are ideally located across the most interesting L-shells, covering Van Allen Radiation Belts (L=1.5-2.5 and 4-6), auroral oval (L~6) and even the polar cap (L>10).
Another perspective is to look at the "magnetic conjugate points", i.e., to follow the magnetic field lines all the way down to the ground at the opposite magnetic hemisphere. Unfortunately, our stations mainly map to the Indian sea, making it practically impossible to study exactly the same magnetospheric field-line from two locations. However, there is one extremely close magnetic field linkage between "our" instrumentation at Svalbard, including the EISCAT radar, and the Australian Antarctic research station Davis with wealth of relevant geophysical instrumentation. This linkage must be studied more carefully in the near future ... Monday, 8 September 2014
Professor Markku Lehtinen's 60th Birthday
Today is Professor Markku Lehtinen's 60th birthday. Professor Lehtinen is considered as founder of the Finnish inverse problems research. His most known contributions include the alternating coding technique for incoherent scatter radars. At the moment, Professor Lehtinen is in charge of the signal- and hardware-design of the next generation distributed phased-array incoherent scatter radar, EISCAT_3D.
Congratulations Markku!
Congratulations Markku!
Sunday, 7 September 2014
The Arecibo Radiotelescope
From 21 to 26 July, the National Science Foundation and the EISCAT Scientific Association organised the 2014 Incoherent Scatter Radar Summer School in Arecibo, Puerto Rico. The Finnish delegation comprised Thomas Ulich (lecturer and organiser, SGO), Antti Kero (lecturer, SGO), Anita Aikio (lecturer, University of Oulu) and myself (student, SGO).
It was such an incredible experience to have this summer school in the legendary Arecibo Observatory by the very edge of the 305-m-wide spherical dish which was built in 1964. This radiotelescope has provided the scientific community with extremely high-quality data in ionosphere physics, radio astronomy and planet and asteroid imaging.
The platform hanging 150 m above the bottom of the dish thanks to strong cables contains two receivers: the line feed and the Gregorian dome. The access to the platform is visible on the top-right-hand corner of the picture below. During the week, the summer school participants were given the chance to get onto that platform.
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| Picture realised by merging ten photographs of small bits of the radar |
Besides the amazing location, this summer school was a great success and provided a unique opportunity for students in ionosphere physics from all around the world (Europe, United States, Japan, China, Peru, Ethiopia...) to meet.
Many thanks to the organisers and the lecturers (may they find an equally extraordinary place for the next summer school)!
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| A soprano of the Arecibo Observatory Coquí Choir (daily performances starting around 19:30) |
Saturday, 6 September 2014
SoftRadar: X-band weather radar project
It was a rather busy week with the X-band radar installation. The outcome was excellent, i.e. a fully working X-band weather radar. Transmission coding and receiver system rely heavily on the USRP technology. Hence, we decided to call this project 'SoftRadar'. Below you may find the interface and SoftRadar experiment design system.
We will continue the development at some suitable point after we have gained some further experience on using the system!
We will continue the development at some suitable point after we have gained some further experience on using the system!
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| Yihenew Dagne from Aalto University made the USRP design and implementation for the SoftRadar! Thanks Yihenew! |
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