Position-Dependent Space Weather Hazards of Societal Significance in the Earth-Ionosphere Waveguide

拟议研究的目标是大大提高我们理解和预测空间天气危害的能力：(1)电网；(2)电磁波在地球电离层波导中的传播频率可达~ 20khz。提出的工作方法是推进和应用详细的、高分辨率的地球电离层波导麦克斯韦方程组模型，该模型是该项目在过去十年中开发的。该项目的三维（3-D）模型独特地包含了诸如地球？完整的地形、海洋、岩石圈组成、地磁场和电离层等离子体。拟议的研究是独一无二的，因为现有的分析公式或计算方法应用于上述调查主题，不能解决完整的麦克斯韦序列，同时也考虑到项目模型允许的所有三维几何细节和时间变化。2008年美国国家科学院的一份报告指出，极端太空天气事件“虽然罕见，但在未来的某个时候可能会再次发生。”然而，如果1859级日冕物质抛射引起的地磁风暴再次发生，由于重要但脆弱的电子技术的扩散，今天的人类社会可能会受到比1859年更大程度的破坏。所提出的建模的第一个目标是帮助单个电网了解它们对空间天气的具体脆弱性。提出的建模的第二个目标是帮助提高我们对干扰条件下地球电离层波导中电磁传播的理解。可能受益于这项工作的应用包括：电离层下部的遥感、假设的电磁地震前兆、闪电传播、地理定位、通信，甚至全球温度变化。

The goal of the proposed research is to greatly improve our ability to understand and predictspace weather hazards to (1) electric power grids; and (2) electromagnetic wave propagation inthe Earth-ionosphere waveguide up to ~20 kHz. The methodology of the proposed work is toadvance and apply detailed, high-resolution Maxwell's equations models of the Earth-ionospherewaveguide developed by the project over the past decade. The project's three-dimensional (3-D) modelsuniquely include such details as the Earth?s complete topography, oceans, lithospherecomposition, geomagnetic field, and ionospheric plasma. The proposed research study is unique as existing analytical formulations or computationalapproaches applied to the investigated topics above do not solve the complete Maxwell'sequations while also accounting for all of the 3-D geometrical details and time variability aspermitted by the project's models.A 2008 National Academies report indicates that extreme spaceweather events, "though rare, are likely to occur again some time in the future." However, a re-occurrenceof an 1859-magnitude CME-driven geomagnetic storm could disrupt today's humansociety to a much greater degree than in 1859 due to the proliferation of vital but vulnerableelectro-technologies. The first goal of the proposed modeling is to help individual power gridstations understand their specific vulnerability to space weather. The second goal of theproposed modeling is to help improve our understanding of electromagnetic propagation in theEarth-ionosphere waveguide under disturbed conditions. Applications that may benefit from thiswork include: remote sensing of the lower ionosphere, hypothesized electromagnetic earthquakeprecursors, propagation from lightning, geolocation, communications, and even globaltemperature change.