The effects and correction of the geometric factor for the POES/MEPED electron flux instrument using a multisatellite comparison

Abstract

AbstractMeasurements from the Polar‐Orbiting Environmental Satellite (POES) Medium Energy Proton and Electron Detector (MEPED) instrument are widely used in studies into radiation belt dynamics and atmospheric coupling. However, this instrument has been shown to have a complex energy‐dependent response to incident particle fluxes, with the additional possibility of low‐energy protons contaminating the electron fluxes. We test the recent Monte Carlo theoretical simulation of the instrument by comparing the responses against observations from an independent experimental data set. Our study examines the reported geometric factors for the MEPED electron flux instrument against the high‐energy resolution Instrument for Detecting Particles (IDPs) on the Detection of Electromagnetic Emissions Transmitted from Earthquake Regions satellite when they are located at similar locations and times, thereby viewing the same quasi‐trapped population of electrons. We find that the new Monte Carlo‐produced geometric factors accurately describe the response of the POES MEPED instrument. We go on to develop a set of equations such that integral electron fluxes of a higher accuracy are obtained from the existing MEPED observations. These new MEPED integral fluxes correlated very well with those from the IDP instrument (>99.9% confidence level). As part of this study we have also tested a commonly used algorithm for removing proton contamination from MEPED instrument observations. We show that the algorithm is effective, providing confirmation that previous work using this correction method is valid.