When it comes to tools, the more they are used, the less reliable they can become.
And sure enough, while the Wide-angle and spectrometric coronagraph experiment (LASCO) instrument at NASA and the European Space Agency‘S SOHO (Solar and Heliosphere Observatory) spacecraft have done an excellent job of providing us with images during the recent powerful geomagnetic solar stormsit’s getting old.
a coronagraph is a specialized instrument designed to block the light from light the sun so researchers can get a glimpse of the hot, thin, and outermost layer of the blazing star, the corona. Space weather forecasters can therefore use coronagraphs to spot solar flares originating from sunspots and accompanying coronal mass ejections (CMEs). However, LASCO is currently on its own room because there is no backup coronagraph instrument available for scientists to monitor the sun’s activity.
“Coronagraph images are crucial for us to detect the CME, measure it, place the information in a model and, based on the model, predict its arrival if it is going to have consequences. Soil,” Bill Murtagh, program coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Center for Space Weather Forecasting (SWPC), told Space.com: “The coronagraph we have relied on (LASCO) is often unavailable because it is a research instrument. It’s a single point of failure, so if he’s gone tomorrow we’d be in a bad situation.”
Related: Powerful new NOAA weather satellite ready for launch in June atop SpaceX Falcon Heavy
The only other technology studying the Sun’s CMEs is NASA’s Observatory for Solar-Terrestrial Relations (STEREO)but of the twin spacecraft involved in this mission, only one remains operational and rarely runs between the earth and the sun.
SOHO was launched into space in December 1995 and became operational in April 1996. It shows the LASCO instrument, which contains three coronagraphs that take pictures of the solar corona. The main purpose of the mission was to conduct experimental research and not to provide real-time updates on the sun’s activity. So the data coming in is not continuous, and the legacy instrument can see when activity is happening, but cannot characterize what exactly is going on.
The downlinks of data from LASCO by NASA’s Deep Space Network Frankly, it also creates gaps in telling the Sun’s story, as there can be gaps in the data of up to eight or more hours at a time. time. This delay can pose problems in predicting the arrival times of CMEs and alerting forecasters if there are several following an initial eruption. The instrument has also suffered a lot over the past twenty years thanks to the solar activity coming from the sun, especially when it comes to the solar panels. Energetic particles continue to break down these panels, and scientists say a recent check of the instruments shows they only have enough power to last until 2026.
Whether LASCO goes offline permanently or temporarily, scientists remain concerned about its reliability given its age and limited lifespan.
“Imagine if that happened during the solar storms, we would have been blind to what was coming our way. The coronagraph is our early warning detection system,” said Elsayed Talaat, director of NOAA. Bureau of Space Weather Observations at the National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service (NESDIS), Space.com told us. “When we see these storms coming from the sun, [coronagraphs] tell us something big is coming our way and we’ll input the characteristics of that coronal mass ejection into our models and project them to see if there will be an impact here.
Next month, when the NOAAs GOES-U satellite is launched into spaceon board it will be the Naval research laboratory Compact Coronagraph-1 (CCOR-1). This will be the first operational coronagraph for the US as it will be operated NASA and funded and administered by NOAA; It is also expected to send back data much faster with more detailed information about CMEs, including how big they are, the speed at which they travel and their density. This information is important for forecasters to issue watches at least one day before possible geomagnetic storm conditions.
“These observations are critical to the Space Weather Prediction Center’s (SWPC) ability to warn and predict. Without these observations from space, we would be blind to where the activity is happening on the planet. sunspots … we need to make those measurements in space,” Talaat said. “Because we look at the sun in the ultraviolet and X-ray frequencies, which we can’t see from the ground, space allows us to see it 24 hours a day. 7. We also need to make measurements of the coronal mass ejection in space to get an unobstructed view of these big explosions from the Sun.”
According to to a NOAA releasescientists can deliver images in just 30 minutes after acquisition, instead of the eight hours required by LASCO. Images also come through the device much cleaner, as it is built to reduce the impact that could come with larger solar storms, such as creating white dots or “snow” on the detector. This was a problem scientists recently had with energetic particles from a solar storm hit the Curiosity Rover’s navigation camera on Marscausing the image to become blurry.
RELATED STORIES:
— Next generation satellites will paint a clearer picture of a changing Earth
– NASA chooses SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy to launch the GOES-U weather satellite
– Earth Day 2024: Witness our changing planet in 12 incredible satellite images
“We will have the ability for the first time to have an artificial solar eclipse, a total solar eclipse, every 30 minutes. That will give us a very good power right now,” Talaat said. “It will be a better detector, so we get high resolution on the coronal mass ejections and the instrument is designed to be more resilient.”
LASCO’s research has been important in helping scientists better understand the Sun’s atmosphere and its influence on space weather, but as it nears the end of its chapter, CCOR-1 is ready to begin a new one. And what better way to end this series of GOES satellites with the beginning of a new era for studying and predicting weather in the great unknown.