Citizen CATE at the 2024 Total Solar Eclipse

公民 CATE 参加 2024 年日全食

• 批准号: 2231658
• 负责人: Amir Caspi
• 金额: $ 29.94万
• 依托单位: Southwest Research Institute
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2022-09-01 至 2024-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2231658&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Citizen; CATE; 2024; Total; Solar

In August of 2017, the Great American Eclipse traversed the continental United States from Oregon to South Carolina. The Citizen Continental-America Telescopic Eclipse (Citizen CATE) successfully deployed over 300 volunteer citizen scientists at 68 sites to continuously observe totality from coast to coast. That effort resulted in a novel and unique dataset containing 90 minutes of continuous coverage of the inner solar corona. On April 8, 2024, a total solar eclipse (TSE) will again traverse United States, this time from Texas to Maine. The project outlined here is to build on the successes of CATE 2017 and improve the observations with upgraded instrumentation to include a larger-format camera and polarization measurements, providing a wider field of view and diagnostic of coronal density not previously possible. CATE 2024 project will deploy 40 teams of citizen scientists along the path of totality to collect over 60 minutes of high-resolution data, which will be used to study the hard to observe middle corona. Previous planning work including site selection, identification of necessary equipment, and initial development of the citizen science network has already been carried out. This project will begin the implementation of the planned activities, which includes equipment purchase and telescope building; training on equipment and in solar astronomy for citizen science teams that will train teams within their regions; and implementing software upgrades to ensure consistency in data collection. Practice with the equipment for the citizen science training teams includes a workshop to be held at the Southwest Research Institute campus and travel to Australia for the April 2023 total solar eclipse. The project’s broader societal impact includes engagement with Native American and other underrepresented community groups along the eclipse path and the donation of telescopes to community groups for their use after the eclipse. CATE 2024 will use high-cadence high dynamic range (HDR) polarimetric observations of the corona to characterize the physical processes that shape the heating, structure, and evolution of the solar corona at scales that cannot be studied outside of a TSE. The science objectives of CATE 2024 are to (1) determine the connectivity of structures that span the middle corona, where the coronal magnetic field transitions from primarily closed to primarily open; (2) measure the flow of the nascent solar wind, by characterizing small scale dynamics that occur during the eclipse; and (3) identify and characterize magnetic reconnection, which is believed to generate structure in the solar wind and to heat the low and middle corona, by identifying features and dynamics related to this process.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

2017年8月，美国伟大的日食从俄勒冈州到南卡罗来纳州的美国大陆穿越。公民大陆 - 美国望远镜日食（Citizen Cate）成功地部署了300多名志愿公民科学家，在68个地点，不断地观察到从海岸到海岸的总数。这项努力导致了一个新颖而独特的数据集，其中包含90分钟的内部太阳能电晕的连续覆盖范围。 2024年4月8日，这次是从德克萨斯州到缅因州的太阳日食（TSE）将再次穿越美国。此处概述的项目是基于Cate 2017的成功，并通过升级的仪器改进观察结果，包括更大的格式摄像头和极化测量值，从而提供了以前不可能的冠状密度的广泛视野和诊断。 CATE 2024项目将在整体的道路上部署40个公民科学家团队，以收集60分钟的高分辨率数据，这些数据将用于研究难以观察的Middle Corona。先前的计划工作，包括现场选择，必要设备的识别以及公民科学网络的初步开发。该项目将开始实施计划的活动，其中包括设备购买和望远镜大楼；对设备和太阳天文学的培训，为公民科学团队培训，该团队将在其地区培训团队；并实施软件升级以确保数据收集的一致性。公民科学培训团队的设备进行练习，其中包括将在西南研究所校园举行的研讨会，并前往澳大利亚，参加2023年4月的日食。该项目的更广泛的社会影响包括与美洲原住民和Eclipse道路上其他代表性不足的社区团体的交往以及向社区团体捐赠望远镜后的望远镜。 CATE 2024将使用电晕的高振动高动态范围（HDR）极化观测值来表征在无法在TSE之外研究的尺度上太阳能电晕的加热，结构和演变的物理过程。 CATE 2024的科学目标是（1）确定横跨Middle Corona的结构的连通性，其中冠状磁场从初级封闭到原发性开放式转变； （2）通过表征日食期间发生的小规模动力学来测量新生太阳风的流动； （3）识别和表征磁重新连接，据信这可以通过识别与此过程相关的功能和动态来产生太阳风中的结构，并加热低调和中间的电晕。该奖项反映了NSF的法定任务，并被认为是值得通过基金会的知识分子和更广泛影响的评估来通过评估来获得支持的审查标准。