Collaborative Research: Remote Sensing of the Lower Ionosphere during 2024 Solar Eclipse: Revealing the Spatial and Temporal Scales of Ionization and Recombination

合作研究：2024 年日食期间低电离层遥感：揭示电离和重组的时空尺度

• 批准号: 2320259
• 负责人: Mark Golkowski
• 金额: $ 23.82万
• 依托单位: University of Colorado at Denver
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2024-02-01 至 2026-01-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2320259&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Remote; Sensing; Lower

This award involves a collaboration between the University of Colorado Denver and University of California Berkeley to study the ionosphere during a solar eclipse. Very low frequency radio observations will be made during the 2024 solar eclipse in the eastern United States. A solar eclipse is a rare event in which the radiation from the sun is partially or totally obscured by the moon for a few minutes. A solar eclipse is not only spectacular to observe but also provides a rare opportunity to study the physical and chemical processes of the ionosphere. In particular, the lowest part of the ionosphere is significantly modified by the sun and is difficult to study. A solar eclipse offers the opportunity to observe a day-night-day change of the ionosphere on the scale of a few minutes. Observations made during an eclipse therefore provide a key insight into how the sun changes the lower ionosphere. Understanding the lower ionosphere is important to improving long distant communications and understanding space weather processes that affect an increasing number of technologies. A number of students from the diverse populations at both universities will support the effort and be trained to make low frequency radio wave observations and their interpretations. This collaborative project combines the resources of CU Denver and UC Berkeley to study the lower ionosphere during the solar eclipse of 2024 in the United States, using VLF and ELF remote sensing techniques. Three types of receiver hardware will be used to make synergistic observations during the solar eclipse events. The observations will be interpreted with numerical modeling efforts to answer outstanding questions on the dynamics of the lower ionosphere during an eclipse. The three science questions are 1) What is the lateral and vertical structure of the ionosphere in the totality zone of the solar eclipse? 2) What are the observed ionospheric perturbations when the region of totality is near a powerful VLF transmitter? and 3) What is the lower ionosphere characteristic reaction time to a point like perturbation from the eclipse? The specifics of the 2024 total solar eclipse bring the lunar shadow to the close vicinity of the most powerful VLF transmitter in the United States. This offers a unique opportunity to study a solar eclipse with higher resolution and in the presence of local heating effects.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该奖项涉及科罗拉多大学丹佛分校和加州大学伯克利分校之间的合作，研究日食期间的电离层。 2024 年美国东部日食期间将进行甚低频射电观测。 日食是一种罕见的事件，其中太阳的辐射部分或全部被月球遮挡了几分钟。日食不仅观察起来很壮观，而且还提供了研究电离层物理和化学过程的难得机会。特别是电离层的最低部分受到太阳的显着改变，难以研究。日食提供了观察电离层几分钟的昼夜变化的机会。 因此，日食期间的观测提供了有关太阳如何改变低电离层的重要见解。了解低电离层对于改善远距离通信和了解影响越来越多技术的空间天气过程非常重要。 两所大学来自不同人群的许多学生将支持这一努力，并接受培训以进行低频无线电波观测及其解释。该合作项目结合了加州大学丹佛分校和加州大学伯克利分校的资源，利用 VLF 和 ELF 遥感技术研究 2024 年美国日食期间的低电离层。三种类型的接收器硬件将用于在日食事件期间进行协同观测。这些观测结果将通过数值模拟工作进行解释，以回答有关日食期间低电离层动力学的突出问题。 这三个科学问题是： 1）日全食区电离层的横向和垂直结构是什么？ 2) 当全食区靠近强大的甚低频发射机时，观察到的电离层扰动是什么？ 3) 到日食扰动点的较低电离层特征反应时间是多少？ 2024 年日全食的具体情况使月影靠近美国最强大的甚低频发射机。 这提供了一个独特的机会，以更高分辨率和局部加热效应来研究日食。该奖项反映了 NSF 的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。