MagneToRE: Mapping the 3-D Magnetic Structure of the Solar Wind Using a Large Constellation of Nanosatellites
MagneToRE: Mapping the 3-D Magnetic Structure of the Solar Wind Using a Large Constellation of Nanosatellites
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DOI：
10.3389/fspas.2021.665885
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发表时间：
2021-07
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通讯作者：
B. Maruca;Jeffersson A. Agudelo Rueda;R. Bandyopadhyay;F. Bianco;A. Chasapis;R. Chhiber;H. DeWeese;W. Matthaeus;D. Miles;R. Qudsi;Michael J. Richardson;S. Servidio;M. Shay;D. Sundkvist;D. Verscharen;S. Vines;J. Westlake;R. Wicks
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作者：
B. Maruca;Jeffersson A. Agudelo Rueda;R. Bandyopadhyay;F. Bianco;A. Chasapis;R. Chhiber;H. DeWeese;W. Matthaeus;D. Miles;R. Qudsi;Michael J. Richardson;S. Servidio;M. Shay;D. Sundkvist;D. Verscharen;S. Vines;J. Westlake;R. Wicks
与绝大多数天体物理等离子体不同，太阳风可以被航天器获取，几十年来，航天器一直携带现场仪器来直接测量其粒子和场。尽管此类测量提供了精确而详细的信息，但单个航天器本身无法理清空间和时间波动。即使是规模不大的原位航天器星座，虽然能够表征一个或多个尺度的波动，但也无法完全确定等离子体的 3-D 结构。我们在此描述了新任务的概念，即磁拓扑重建探测器（MagneToRE），该任务将由大量原位航天器组成，并且首次能够重建太阳风动态磁结构的 3D 地图。这些纳米卫星中的每一颗都将基于立方体卫星的外形尺寸，并携带一个紧凑的磁通门磁力计。更大的航天器将部署这些较小的航天器，并充当它们与地面的遥测链路和辅助科学仪器的主机。由于航天器和仪器小型化的进步以及数据科学和机器学习的突破，这样一个雄心勃勃的任务在典型的资金限制下是可行的。
Unlike the vast majority of astrophysical plasmas, the solar wind is accessible to spacecraft, which for decades have carried in-situ instruments for directly measuring its particles and fields. Though such measurements provide precise and detailed information, a single spacecraft on its own cannot disentangle spatial and temporal fluctuations. Even a modest constellation of in-situ spacecraft, though capable of characterizing fluctuations at one or more scales, cannot fully determine the plasma’s 3-D structure. We describe here a concept for a new mission, the Magnetic Topology Reconstruction Explorer (MagneToRE), that would comprise a large constellation of in-situ spacecraft and would, for the first time, enable 3-D maps to be reconstructed of the solar wind’s dynamic magnetic structure. Each of these nanosatellites would be based on the CubeSat form-factor and carry a compact fluxgate magnetometer. A larger spacecraft would deploy these smaller ones and also serve as their telemetry link to the ground and as a host for ancillary scientific instruments. Such an ambitious mission would be feasible under typical funding constraints thanks to advances in the miniaturization of spacecraft and instruments and breakthroughs in data science and machine learning.