Preface

Abstract

The 20th Annual International Astrophysics Conference (AIAC) was held at the La Posada de Santa Fe Hotel, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA from October 31 to November 4, 2022. This year’s meeting followed in the footsteps of 2020’s COVID-19-affected meeting and was the first AIAC since the pandemic. Understandably, the re-opening of the AIAC meetings proceeded cautiously but we are happy to report that the meeting went exceptionally smoothly, safety protocols were followed, and an enjoyable and stimulating meeting was held. Leading the way in ensuring a safe and successful meeting was of course the conference organizer Adele Corona of ICNS and her assistant Kathy Tolbert, and the staff at the La Posada. With the successful conclusion of this meeting, we look forward to a degree of normalcy in organizing meetings and conferences in future.The theme of the 20th AIAC was “From the Depths of the Solar Corona to the Darkness of Interstellar Space: A 20 Year Perspective” with our now traditional format of 25-minute presentations punctuated by selected 40-minute invited talks that explored various themes in greater detail.The intent of the 20th AIAC was twofold – retrospective, celebrating the solar, space, and astrophysical accomplishments of the past 20 years as expressed in the 19 prior AIAC conferences, and perspective, i.e., examining some of the pressing questions that taxed our community over the past 20 years from the perspective of what we think we now know and understand. Since the 19 previous meetings addressed the broad themes of the interaction of the outer heliosphere and the local interstellar medium, shock waves and nonlinear processes, energetic particles, particle acceleration and transport, the heating and physics of the solar corona and solar wind, turbulence processes, and much more, these were the themes of the 20th iteration of the AIAC. A characteristic theme of previous meetings was the universality of many of the physical processes that informed the conference, and this was a central element of the 20th celebration.Finally, let me thank again Adele Corona for another outstanding meeting. Her ability to create and organize superbly run and efficient conferences is unmatched. Likewise, we thank her long-time assistant Kathy Tolbert for her excellent help. Finally, thanks as always to Adele for her help in providing the logistical support for this volume of papers.