BALLOON-VIKING DATA ANALYSIS

1986年7月的维京-气球运动是一项国际合作的努力，其目标是利用地面、气球和宇宙飞船的相关测量来进一步了解极光和相关的磁层过程。该运动从许多互补的仪器中获得了丰富的数据，提供了从几个不同角度研究极光过程的机会，从全球尺度到非常局部的现象，涉及许多相关参数-高能和低能粒子以及电场和磁场-来自广泛不同的空间区域。从这些数据得到的初步结果表明脉动极光具有有趣的结构。这笔拨款将支持对这一广泛数据集的分析，这些数据集在许多磁层极光问题方面具有巨大的潜力。极光的动力学可以从几个不同的状态进行研究，每个状态都有其特征长度和时间尺度。极轨卫星和火箭实验具有就地测量局部等离子体参数的优势，但是轨道运动的限制使许多这些实验（特别是火箭和低空航天器）无法进行长时间尺度的测量。此外，由于收集数据的单一点，在将空间效应与时间效应分开时总是存在固有的模糊性。卫星成像的极光椭圆和极帽是一个强大的工具，但并不总是完全阐明小尺度动力学发生在一个极光弧。然而，由于气球的运动通常比许多典型的极光时间尺度慢得多，因此气球携带的仪器能够检查极光现象的更长时间尺度行为。此外，利用成像技术和多点测量可以对时空模糊进行反卷积。这些成像技术可以在短短几秒钟内检查几十公里尺度长度的结构。这就是维京气球计划的总体理念；利用气球的x射线成像作为工具，了解极地电离层-磁层在时间和长度尺度上的动力学，这是其他方法难以获得的，并将这些测量结果与极地轨道航天器的数据联系起来。瑞典太空公司的维京号卫星提供了进行这项实验的机会。华盛顿大学将继续处理和科学分析维京气球活动期间获得的数据，并利用维京气球数据参与与国际小组在极光和磁层动力学方面的协调研究。

The Viking-Balloon campaign in July 1986 was an international collaborative effort and its goal was to utilize correlative measurements from ground, balloon, and space-craft to further understand aurora and the associated magnetospheric processes. The campaign resulted in a wealth of data from many complementary instruments providing an opportunity to study auroral processes from several different perspectives, from global scale to very localized phenomena, involving many relevant parameters - high and low energy particles and electric and magnetic fields - from widely varying regions of space. Preliminary results from the data have already been obtained which indicate interesting structure to pulsating aurora. This grant will support analysis of this extensive data set which has tremendous potential with regard to many magnetospheric-auroral problems. The dynamics of the aurora can be studied from several different regimes, each one distinguished by its characteristic length and time scales. Polar orbiting satellites and rocket experiments have the advantage of making in situ measurements of the local plasma parameters, however the constraints of orbital motion prevent many of these experiments (in particular, rockets and low altitude spacecraft) from making measurements over long time scales. Furthermore there is always an inherent ambiguity in separating spatial effect from temporal effects, due to the single point from which the data is gathered. Satellite imaging of the auroral oval and the polar cap is a powerful tool, but does not always fully elucidate the small scale dynamics occurring within an auroral arc. Balloon borne instruments, however, are able to examine the longer time scale behavior of auroral phenomena, since the balloon's motion is usually much slower than many typical auroral time scales. Furthermore, the space-time ambiguity can be deconvolved by the use of imaging techniques, and multiple point measurements. These imaging techniques allow an examination of structures of scale lengths of order tens of kilometers in as short as a few seconds. This was the general philosophy in the Viking-balloons project; to employ X-ray imaging from a balloon as a tool to understand Polar Ionospheric-Magnetospheric dynamics on time and length scales which are not easily obtainable by other means, and to correlate these measurements to data from a polar orbiting space craft. The Viking satellite from the Swedish Space Corporation provided an opportunity to carry out this experiment. The University of Washington will continue processing and scientific analysis of data obtained during the Viking balloon campaign and take part in coordinated studies with the international group in auroral and magnetospheric dynamics using the Viking-balloon data.