Scientific Studies from a Network of Sustainable, Robotic Observatories Across the Antarctic Ice-shelf: A New Approach to Polar Research

来自横跨南极冰架的可持续机器人观测站网络的科学研究：极地研究的新方法

• 批准号: 1716192
• 负责人: Allan Weatherwax
• 金额: $ 26.97万
• 依托单位: Merrimack College
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2016
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2016-03-04 至 2021-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1716192&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Scientific; Studies; Network; Sustainable; Robotic

The near-Earth environment (Geospace) is mostly controlled by the Earth's magnetic field, which provides the Earth with protection from phenomena of electromagnetic nature, such as solar flares, coronal mass ejection, etc.; some of these events could be very dangerous and affect and even damage satellites, their instrumentation, and their communication with ground centers. However, the Earth's magnetic field has some specific regions where it is exposed to all these impacts from outer space. The polar caps are specific areas around the geomagnetic poles where geomagnetic field lines are open and directly interact with the interplanetary magnetic field (that is an extended magnetic field of the Sun). During strong geomagnetic disturbances, the polar caps increase their size - sometimes dramatically. Monitoring the Earth's polar regions, geomagnetic disturbances, currents that flow over these regions, polar cap boundary dynamics, etc., are important issues of space weather studies. Hundreds of magnetometers observe the Northern hemisphere polar cap and auroral zone on a regular basis. However, the Southern hemisphere has many fewer observatories. Having a large network of magnetometers for monitoring the geomagnetic environment is vital for understanding space weather-related events and their impact on environments, since the number of satellites in Geospace continues to grow very fast.One of the major problems in developing an observational infrastructure in Antarctica is the enormous difficulty for people to reach the region and to stay there. This factor makes any scientific project extremely expensive. Therefore, the development of Automatic Geophysical Observatories (AGO) that can function autonomously with minimal human interaction and maintenance provides a unique opportunity that can solve the problem. The arrangement of instrumentation produces data with a high potential to provide key advances in the field and that are highly demanded by scientific community. The science questions to be addressed in this research effort are: (1) Is the synoptic fluxgate magnetometer determination of the open-closed magnetic field boundary (OCB) valid; (2) What are impacts of solar wind structures on the OCB morphology; (3) How synoptic structures of GPS scintillations are relevant to OCB dynamics, and (4) Could the Iridium's Short Burst Data system be used to transmit fluxgate magnetometer data at a 1-hour time lag. The research is a cost-effective investment that will advance the state of knowledge of the Geospace domain and provide scientific community with vital observations.

近地环境（地球空间）主要受地球磁场控制，地球磁场为地球提供了免受电磁性质现象的保护，例如太阳耀斑、日冕物质抛射等；其中一些事件可能非常危险，会影响甚至损坏卫星、其仪器以及与地面中心的通信。然而，地球磁场有一些特定区域，会受到来自外太空的所有这些影响。极帽是地磁极周围的特定区域，其中地磁力线开放并直接与行星际磁场（即太阳的扩展磁场）相互作用。在强烈的地磁扰动期间，极冠的尺寸会增大——有时甚至会急剧增大。监测地球极区、地磁扰动、流经这些区域的洋流、极冠边界动力学等是空间天气研究的重要问题。数百个磁力计定期观测北半球极冠和极光带。然而，南半球的天文台要少得多。由于地球空间中的卫星数量持续快速增长，拥有用于监测地磁环境的大型磁力计网络对于了解空间天气相关事件及其对环境的影响至关重要。在南极洲发展观测基础设施的主要问题之一是人们到达该地区并停留在那里的巨大困难。这个因素使得任何科学项目都极其昂贵。因此，开发能够以最少的人类交互和维护自主运行的自动地球物理观测站（AGO）提供了解决该问题的独特机会。仪器的布置产生的数据很有可能提供该领域的关键进展，并且受到科学界的强烈需求。本研究要解决的科学问题是：（1）天气磁通门磁力计测定开闭磁场边界（OCB）是否有效； (2) 太阳风结构对OCB形态有何影响； (3) GPS 闪烁的天气结构如何与 OCB 动力学相关，以及 (4) 铱星的短爆发数据系统能否用于以 1 小时的时滞传输磁通门磁力计数据。这项研究是一项具有成本效益的投资，将提高地球空间领域的知识水平，并为科学界提供重要的观测结果。