Serendipity and the Utlization of the Spacelab Imaging Spectrometric Observatory as a Test Class-A Spectroscopy Facility for CEDAR

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A NASA Spacelab flight instrument is available for ground based observations for a period of a year owing to the delays in flight schedules caused by the Challenger accident. It is proposed to operate this highly sophisticated set of spectrographs with intensified CCD detectors at McDonald Observatory until June 1988, to obtain spectra of upper atmosphere emissions in twilight. The spectra would be used in the inversion of a thermospheric photochemistry model in an attempt to deduce changes in the composition and temperature of the thermosphere on a day to day basis, in conformity with a CEDAR project. The thermospheric composition and temperature change in response to auroral zone energy inputs which propagate over the globe, and to changing solar ultraviolet fluxes on a seasonal and solar cycle basis. Currently the composition changes can only be determined by in-situ spacecraft observations. The PI has both the observational and the theoretical background to make full use of the data once obtained, and to provide input to the aeronomy community. They will then be able to design the optimum observing program and instrumental configuration for CEDAR to determine atmospheric composition changes in coordinated multistation campaigns.