[SPA] SPA SECTION NEWSLETTER, Volume XXIX, Issue 7

Tue Jan 25 00:10:27 PST 2022

AMERICAN GEOPHYSICAL UNION
SPA SECTION NEWSLETTER
Volume XXIX, Issue 7
Jan.25,2022

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Table of Contents

1. NASA HQ Citizen Science Announcements

2. JGR Special Issue: "The Demonstration and Science Experiment Satellite: Instruments and Mission Overview"

3. GeoDAWG Seminar Series

4. Radiation Belts in Space Physics (RBSP) Seminars

5. Course on “Radiation Belt Dynamics and Remote Sensing of the Earth’s Plasmasphere”

6. Updated “Principles of Heliophysics: a Textbook on the Universal Processes Behind Planetary Habitability”

7. JOB OPENING: Space Physics Group, Princeton University Department of Astrophysical Sciences

8. JOB OPENING: Postdoctoral Position in Space Weather

9. RHESSI Nuggets in January 2022

10. Subscription to SPA Newsletter: Annual Reminder

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Announcement Submission Website: http://goo.gl/forms/qjcm4dDr4g

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NASA HQ Citizen Science Announcements

From: Susanna Finn, Elizabeth MacDonald, Abigail Rymer  (abigail.m.rymer at nasa.gov)

The Heliophysics Citizen Science Strategic Working Group of NASA HQ (https://science.nasa.gov/heliophysics/programs/citizen-science) announce the following upcoming opportunities for the SPA community. 

1) Deadline extended: Are you interested in starting a citizen science project? In ROSES-2021 Appendix F.9, the 2nd offering of the Citizen Science Seed Funding Program (CSSFP) proposals are now due 15 Feb 2022 (https://science.nasa.gov/researchers/solicitations/roses-2021/amendment-41-citizen-science-seed-funding-program-revised-text-and-new-due-dates) 

2) NASA has developed a Citizen Science for Scientists Roadshow presentation to provide professional scientists with examples, inspiration, and direction to add a Citizen Science element to their work. If you would like to request a presentation from the Citizen Science Roadshow team for your institution, please contact: Mike Cook, michael.r.cook at nasa.gov. 

3)  NASA, along with the citizen science Sungrazer Project and the Laboratory for Innovation Science at Harvard, has initiated a TopCoder data challenge with prizes (https://www.topcoder.com/community/nasa/soho-comet-search). This work is supported by the NASA Open Source Science Initiative and is part of efforts to showcase the cross-disciplinary use of NASA’s science data and encourage public engagement with science data-related problems.  For further information please contact Dr. Ekaterina (Katya) Verner, ekaterina.verner at nasa.gov and see official announcement copied below:

A New NASA Marathon Match is live with over $30,000 in prizes!  Plus, official comet ☄️discovery credit will be given to competitors whose algorithms identify previously unobserved comets 😱! 

NASA Comet Detection Marathon Match

OVERVIEW
The purpose of this project is to develop an Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) tool that will help astronomers detect very faint comets that approach the sun, referred to as “sungrazing comets”. Scientists at NASA want to improve their ability to detect very dim “category C” comets. You can read more project background here!

For more information about NASA [HQ/Heliophysics/SMD] Citizen Science efforts, contact Elizabeth McDonald (elizabeth.a.macdonald at nasa.gov) and Susanna Finn (susanna.c.finn at nasa.gov)

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JGR Special Issue: "The Demonstration and Science Experiment Satellite: Instruments and Mission Overview"

From: Jay Albert (jay.albert at us.af.mil)

The DSX satellite was launched into medium Earth orbit (6000 x 12000 km, 42 deg. inclination) on 25 June 2019, and operated until 31 May 2021. Spanning 80 by 16 meters, the 3-axis stabilized satellite was the largest self-supporting unmanned satellite ever placed in space. Its primary goal was to study the effectiveness and operating characteristics of a VLF transmitter in space, and to study the effects of the radiated waves on trapped energetic electrons. It also made detailed measurements of the ambient particle and plasma distributions in the MEO environment. A third focus was the effects of the space environment on materials and electronics. The data obtained is planned to be made available to all interested researchers. To facilitate their interpretation and analysis, this special issue describes the instruments used to obtain them. We also welcome all submissions on related theory, modeling, and observations. Submissions open 1 February and close 1 May 2022.

To submit your manuscript, use the submission site for JGR-Space Physics and select the collection’s title from the drop down menu in the Special Section field of the submission form.

For more info, feel free to contact the guest editors: Jay Albert (jay.albert at us.af.mil) Lauren Blum (lauren.blum at lasp.colorado.edu)

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GeoDAWG Seminar Series

From: Larry Kepko, Anthony Sciola, Adam Michael  (adam.michael at jhuapl.edu)

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to invite you to attend the monthly seminar series of the IAGA “Geospace Data Assimilation Working Group” (GeoDAWG). GeoDAWG’s purpose is to provide a forum to aid in the discussion of data assimilative modeling methods across the geospace sciences. More information can be found on our website: https://sites.google.com/view/geodawg/home

Seminars will be held virtually at 11 am EST on the first Tuesday of every month. 

The next seminar will be on January 25, given by Tim Kodikara titled “Data assimilation in the thermosphere-ionosphere-electrodynamics general circulation model (TIE-GCM),” followed by another seminar on February 1, given by Donglai Ma on “Machine learning models and Data-driven method of radiation belt dynamics.” 

A link to join the seminar via Zoom can be found on the GeoDawg website: https://sites.google.com/view/geodawg/seminars, along with the current GeoDAWG seminar schedule, which is updated regularly.

You can request to join our mailing list, https://sites.google.com/view/geodawg/mailing-list, if you would like to receive our regular newsletter where we share research highlights and information relevant to the community.

Speaker suggestions or questions can be also submitted online: https://sites.google.com/view/geodawg/contact-us, or you can email us directly at iaga.geodawg at gmail.com

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Radiation Belts in Space Physics (RBSP) Seminars

From: Sasha Ukhorskiy (sasha.ukhorskiy at jhuapl.edu)

We are pleased to announce a virtual monthly seminar series, “Radiation Belts in Space Physics (RBSP)”, to serve as a new community forum dedicated to the exploration and Space Weather effects of energetic particle processes at Earth and other magnetized planets and bodies across the heliosphere and beyond. Each seminar will bring several experts to present recent advances in the field and lead an open discussion on a given research topic. 

RBSP seminars will be held every fourth Friday at 12:00 ET US starting on 28 January. Each seminar will be announced separately via SPA newsletter and the email list: RBSP-SWG-L at listserv.jhuapl.edu. To receive Zoom and dial-in details for the seminars as well as other related announcements and offline discussions please subscribe to the list by emailing Sasha.Ukhorskiy at jhuapl.edu. 

The first seminar will be dedicated to particle radiation in the Jovian magnetosphere. George Clark will present new discoveries and lessons learned from the Juno mission, and talk about a new Heliophysics Mission Concept, COMPASS, to unveil the mysteries of the highest energy particles at Jupiter. Bin Zhang will discuss the state-of-the-art in global modeling as a framework for understanding energetic particle processes in the Jovian magnetosphere.   

RBSP SOC: Lauren Blum, Wen Li, Yoshi Miyoshi, Jean-Francois Ripoll, and Sasha Ukhorskiy

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Course on “Radiation Belt Dynamics and Remote Sensing of the Earth’s Plasmasphere”

From: Umberto Villante (ssc at aquila.infn.it)

The International School of Space Science of the Consorzio Interuniversitario per la Fisica Spaziale organizes a Course on “Radiation Belt Dynamics and Remote Sensing of the Earth’s Plasmasphere”, to be held in L’Aquila, Italy, 26-30 September, 2022 directed by Prof. János Lichtenberger (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary), Prof. G. Reeves (Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, USA) and Prof. Massimo Vellante (University of L’Aquila, L’Aquila, Italy).

The course is designed for PhD students and young post-doctoral researchers. It will offer an overview of the current knowledge of a key Space Weather region, the radiation belts, and in particular on its related energization and loss processes due to wave-particle interactions, and particle precipitation into the atmosphere. These processes are strongly governed by the properties of the plasmasphere (the outward extension of the ionosphere) which is partially overlapping with the radiation belts.  Part of the course will be then devoted to present, both from a theoretical and observational point of view, as well as through modelling, the basic plasmasphere dynamics, including its coupling with the ionosphere.

Applications are due before May 22, 2022.
For more information visit http://www.cifs-isss.org/ or send an e-mail to ssc at aquila.infn.it

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Updated “Principles of Heliophysics: a Textbook on the Universal Processes Behind Planetary Habitability”

From: Karel Schrijver (karelschrijver at gmail.com)

The multitude of connections between heliophysics, astrophysics, and planetary sciences is explored in this free textbook that emphasizes universal processes from a perspective that draws attention to what provides Earth (and similar (exo-)planets) with a relatively stable setting in which life as we know it can thrive. The text includes many “activities” in the form of problems, exercises, explorations, literature readings, and “what if” challenges. In this updated version, 94 of the 202 activities have been substantively revised, replaced, added or removed, while also typos in the main text have been corrected and some clarifications have been added. 

The book can be accessed at https://arxiv.org/abs/1910.14022 or via the textbook ‘resources’ page of the Heliophysics Summer School: https://cpaess.ucar.edu/heliophysics/resources/textbooks.

The textbook is based on a series of 'Heliophysics' books (Cambridge University Press). Whereas the original books were written for advanced PhD students and beginning postdocs, this book is intended for students in physical sciences in later years of their university training and for beginning graduate students in fields of solar, stellar, (exo-)planetary, and planetary-system sciences.

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JOB OPENING: Space Physics Group, Princeton University Department of Astrophysical Sciences

From: Dan White (spacephysics at princeton.edu)

The Space Physics Group (see https://spacephysics.princeton.edu/) in the Department of Astrophysical Sciences, Princeton University, anticipates offering one or more postdoctoral or more senior research positions in the observational study of Solar Energetic Particles (SEPs) and Energetic Neutral Atoms (ENAs).

The Space Physics Group researches many aspects of space physics (aka Heliophysics), with a strong emphasis on experimental and observational space plasma physics. The Group currently leads NASA's Parker Solar Probe (PSP) Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun (ISOIS) energetic particle instrument suite.  The Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission and the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) mission, which will launch in 2025 to explore the details of particle acceleration and the Sun's interaction with the local interstellar medium.

The successful candidate(s) will play a significant role in the analysis and publication of SEP observations from ISOIS and/or ENA observations from IBEX and must have both significant prior experiences analyzing at least one of these type(s) of particle data, as well as the proven ability to lead and participate in the rapid development and publication of numerous excellent research articles. A Ph.D. is required in physics, astrophysics, space science, or a closely related field.

Interested persons must apply online at https://puwebp.princeton.edu/AcadHire/apply/application.xhtml?listingId=22241, Selecting Space Physics as the position you are interested in.

For further inquiries, contact spacephysics at princeton.edu

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JOB OPENING: Postdoctoral Position in Space Weather

From: Andrew P, Dimmock (andrew.dimmock at irfu.se)

Applications are invited to IRF (Swedish Institute of Space Physics) for investigations into space weather, in particular how space weather impacts the Swedish power grid due to geomagnetic disturbances. The work involves the analysis of geomagnetic data from ground magnetic observatories (e.g. IMAGE, SuperMAG, INTERMAGNET) and global space weather models (e.g. SWMF).

The position is available at the Uppsala office of IRF, located at the Ångström Laboratory in Uppsala, Sweden, for 2 years with a possibility for an extension. The position is funded by the Swedish Research Council (VR). 

For more information:
https://www.irf.se/en/news/2022/01/19/postdoctoral-position-in-space-weather/

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RHESSI Nuggets in January 2022

From: Hugh Hudson (hugh.hudson at glasgow.ac.uk)

No. 424, “Disk Occultation of a Lopsided Sun,” by Hugh HUDSON, Stephen WHITE, and Säm KRUCKER. Observing a spotless Sun can enable observations of the faint corona.

No. 425, “A solar flare driven by thermal conduction observed in mid-infrared,” by Guillermo GIMÉNEZ de CASTRO. Strong 10-micron emission from a GOES C2 flare suggests conductive heating.

We welcome contributions to the RHESSI Nuggets, and the topics may wander some distance away from specifically RHESSI results if they are generally interesting. See http://sprg.ssl.berkeley.edu/~tohban/wiki/index.php/RHESSI_Science_Nuggets for these and others. Comments about specific flares can often be found by searching for their SOLyyyy-mm-dd identifier from this home page.

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Subscription to SPA Newsletter: Annual Reminder

From: Peter Chi (pchi at igpp.ucla.edu)

The SPA Newsletter serves more than two thousand subscribers in the international Space Physics and Aeronomy community. Please forward this e-mail newsletter to your new colleagues or students who may not have been receiving the SPA Newsletter. Subscription requests and changes can be made at the mail service web page at:

http://lists.igpp.ucla.edu/mailman/listinfo/spa

Announcement requests should be made at the following online Google form:

http://goo.gl/forms/qjcm4dDr4g

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SPA Newsletter Editorial Team: Peter Chi (Editor), Guan Le (Co-Editor), Sharon Uy, Marjorie Sowmendran, and Kevin Addison

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