Abstract
Unlike the vast majority of astrophysical plasmas, the solar wind is accessible to spacecraft, which for decades have carried in-situ instruments for directly measuring its particles and fields. Though such measurements provide precise and detailed information, a single spacecraft on its own cannot disentangle spatial and temporal fluctuations. Even a modest constellation of in-situ spacecraft, though capable of characterizing fluctuations at one or more scales, cannot fully determine the plasma’s 3-D structure. We describe here a concept for a new mission, the Magnetic Topology Reconstruction Explorer (MagneToRE), that would comprise a large constellation of in-situ spacecraft and would, for the first time, enable 3-D maps to be reconstructed of the solar wind’s dynamic magnetic structure. Each of these nanosatellites would be based on the CubeSat form-factor and carry a compact fluxgate magnetometer. A larger spacecraft would deploy these smaller ones and also serve as their telemetry link to the ground and as a host for ancillary scientific instruments. Such an ambitious mission would be feasible under typical funding constraints thanks to advances in the miniaturization of spacecraft and instruments and breakthroughs in data science and machine learning.
Highlights
1.1 Mission MotivationThe interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) emerges from the Sun and extends throughout the heliosphere (Parker, 1958)
Images of the solar corona and nascent solar wind reveal that the macroscale IMF is defined by the Parker spiral, interactions among solar wind streams, coronal mass ejections (CMEs), and other global structures and events (Balogh and Erdõs, 2013)
We have traced the macroscale IMF, and, with in-situ measurements from single spacecraft and small constellations of spacecraft, we have observed microscale structures. To close this observational gap that limits our understanding of the mesoscale IMF, we describe a new mission concept, the Magnetic Topology Reconstruction Explorer (MagneToRE), which calls for a large constellation of nanosatellites to produce the first dynamic, 3-D maps of mesoscale structures in any space plasma
Summary
The interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) emerges from the Sun and extends throughout the heliosphere (Parker, 1958) It plays a fundamental role in initially heating and accelerating the solar wind and continues to shape the dynamics of the expanding plasma. We have traced the macroscale IMF, and, with in-situ measurements from single spacecraft and small constellations of spacecraft, we have observed microscale structures To close this observational gap that limits our understanding of the mesoscale IMF, we describe a new mission concept, the Magnetic Topology Reconstruction Explorer (MagneToRE), which calls for a large constellation of nanosatellites to produce the first dynamic, 3-D maps of mesoscale structures in any space plasma. Magnetic structures of this size have been nearly fully processed by mesocale dynamics and provide the 3-D context for microscale phenomena
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