South Pole X-ray Characteristics

这个项目将把极光x射线成像仪与加州大学的天体物理x射线和伽马射线光谱仪放在同一个气球上。其目的是对引起极光的高能电子通量进行定性测量，并将这些测量结果与其他地球物理测量结果（如磁脉动和太阳风的行为）联系起来。极光测量也将利用UCB光谱仪，因为这些光谱仪将在非常小但已知的成像仪视野部分提供高分辨率测量。由此产生的图像还将补充南极新成像里程计（IRIS）所产生的图像。研究人员和华盛顿大学在磁层物理学方面处于领先地位。

This project will fly auroral x-ray imagers on the same balloons as the University of California astrophysical x-ray and gamma ray spectrometers. The purpose is to make qualitative measurements of the flux of energetic electrons that cause the aurora, and to correlate these measurements with other geophysical measurements, such as magnetic pulsations and the behavior of the solar wind. The auroral measurements will also take advantage of the UCB spectrometers, since those will provide high resolution measurements in a very small, but known, portion of the imagers' field of view. The resulting images will also complement the images made by the new imaging riometer (IRIS) at South Pole. The investigators, and the University of Washington, are leaders in magnetospheric physics.