Space Weather: Predicting the Heliosphere

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The aim of this investigation is to fashion a conceptual framework for connecting magnetic flux emergence at the solar surface with the evolution of the overlying solar atmosphere and the solar wind. This will be accomplished by developing a physical theory, and thus a usable model based on this theory, which describes the coupling between the emergence of magnetic flux on the sun and the formation of the heliosphere. The critical premise of the effort is magnetic reconnection between closed-field loops and open field lines. This leads to (i) transport of magnetic flux, (ii) evolution of closed and open field regions, (iii) non-thermal heating of the coronal plasma, and (iv) acceleration and structuring of the solar wind. Each step in the chain will be examined and a quantitative prediction made of the processes involved. These predictions will be compared with observations and tested, thereby producing a conceptual, and physically intuitive, paradigm for this complex system.