Images of Gradual Millimeter Emission and Multi-Wavelength Observations of the 17 august 1994 Solar Flare

We present a comprehensive analysis of the 17 August 1994 flare, the first flare imaged at millimeter (86 GHz) wavelengths. The temporal evolution of this flare displays a prominent impulsive peak shortly after 01:02 UT, observed in hard X-rays and at microwave frequencies, followed by a gradual decay phase. The gradual phase was also detected at 86 GHz. Soft X-ray images show a compact emitting region (20), which is resolved into two sources: a footpoint and a loop top source. Nonthermal emissions at microwave and hard X-ray wavelengths are analyzed and the accelerated electron spectrum is calculated. This energy spectrum derived from the microwave and hard X-ray observations suggests that these emissions were created by the same electron population. The millimeter emission during the gradual phase is thermal bremsstrahlung originating mostly from the top of the flaring loop. The soft X-rays and the millimeter flux density from the footpoint source are only consistent with the presence of a multi-temperature plasma at the footpoint.     

An Ensemble Study of a January 2010 Coronal Mass Ejection (CME): Connecting a Non-obvious Solar Source with Its ICME/Magnetic Cloud

A distinct magnetic cloud (MC) was observed in-situ at the Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO)-B on 20?–?21 January 2010. About three days earlier, on 17 January, a bright flare and coronal mass ejection (CME) were clearly observed by STEREO-B, which suggests that this was the progenitor of the MC. However, the in-situ speed of the event, several earlier weaker events, heliospheric imaging, and a longitude mismatch with the STEREO-B spacecraft made this interpretation unlikely. We searched for other possible solar eruptions that could have caused the MC and found a faint filament eruption and the associated CME on 14?–?15 January as the likely solar source event. We were able to confirm this source by using coronal imaging from the Sun Earth Connection Coronal and Heliospheric Investigation (SECCHI)/EUVI and COR and Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO)/Large Angle and Spectrometric Coronograph (LASCO) telescopes and heliospheric imaging from the Solar Mass Ejection Imager (SMEI) and the STEREO/Heliospheric Imager instruments. We use several empirical models to understand the three-dimensional geometry and propagation of the CME, analyze the in-situ characteristics of the associated ICME, and investigate the characteristics of the MC by comparing four independent flux-rope model fits with the launch observations and magnetic-field orientations. The geometry and orientations of the CME from the heliospheric-density reconstructions and the in-situ modeling are remarkably consistent. Lastly, this event demonstrates that a careful analysis of all aspects of the development and evolution of a CME is necessary to correctly identify the solar counterpart of an ICME/MC.     

The South America VLF NETwork (SAVNET)

In this paper we present the South America VLF NETwork (SAVNET), a new observing facility at very low frequencies. It has been recently installed at different locations spread over Latin America, in Brazil, Peru and Argentina. It consists of a network of seven Very Low Frequency (VLF) receivers with the main scientific objective of monitoring the solar activity on short (minutes to hours) and long (years) time scales. Other objectives include a better understanding of the spatial structure of the South Atlantic Magnetic Anomaly, the study of atmospheric phenomena and the search for genuine seismic-electromagnetic effects. After discussing the scientific goals, the details of the installation are presented as well as the first results recently obtained.     

STEREO/SECCHI Observations on 8 December 2007: Evidence Against the Wave Hypothesis of the EIT Wave Origin

Three-dimensional (3D) tomographic analysis of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) images is used to place empirical constraints on the corona’s temperature and density structure. The input data are images taken by the EUVI instrument on STEREO A and B spacecraft for Carrington Rotation 2069 (16 April to 13 May 2008). While the reconstructions are global, we demonstrate the capabilities of this method by examining specific structures in detail. Of particular importance are the results for coronal cavities and the surrounding helmet streamers, which our method allows to be analyzed without projection effects for the first time. During this rotation, both the northern and southern hemispheres exhibited stable polar crown filaments with overlying EUV cavities. These filaments and cavities were too low-lying to be well observed in white-light coronagraphs. Furthermore, due to projection effects, these cavities were not clearly discernible above the limb in EUV images, thus tomography offers the only option to study their plasma properties quantitatively. It is shown that, when compared to the surrounding helmet material, these cavities have lower densities (about 30%, on average) and broader local differential emission measures that are shifted to higher temperatures than the surrounding streamer plasma.     

Jupiter’s shrinking Great Red Spot and steady Oval BA: Velocity measurements with the ‘Advection Corrected Correlation Image Velocimetry’ automated cloud-tracking method

We show that between 1996 and 2006, the area circumscribed by the high-speed collar of the Great Red Spot (GRS) shrunk by 15%, while the peak velocities within its collar remained constant. This shrinkage indicates a dynamical change in the GRS because the region circumscribed by the collar is nearly coincident with the location of the potential vorticity anomaly of the GRS. It was previously observed that the area of the clouds associated with the GRS has been shrinking. However, the cloud cover of the GRS is not coincident with the location of its potential vorticity anomaly or any other of its known dynamical features. We show that the peak velocities of the Oval BA were nearly the same in 2000, when the Oval was white, and in 2006, when it was red, as were all of the other features of the two velocities fields. To measure temporal changes in the GRS and Oval, we extracted velocities from images taken with Galileo, Cassini, and the Hubble Space Telescope using a new iterative method called Advection Corrected Correlation Image Velocimetry (ACCIV). ACCIV finds correlations over image pairs with 10-h time separations when other automated velocity-extraction methods are limited to time separations of 2 h or less. Typically, ACCIV velocities produced from images separated by 10 h had errors that are 3-6 times smaller than similar velocities extracted from images separated by 2 h or less. ACCIV produces velocity fields containing hundreds of thousands of independent correlation vectors (tie-points). Dense velocity fields are needed to locate the loci of peak velocities and other features.     

Component-resolved near-infrared spectra of the (22) Kalliope system

We observed (22) Kalliope and its companion Linus with the integral-field spectrograph OSIRIS, which is coupled to the adaptive optics system at the W.M. Keck 2 telescope on March 25, 2008. We present, for the first time, component-resolved spectra acquired simultaneously in each of the Zbb (1-1.18 μm), Jbb (1.18-1.42 μm), Hbb (1.47-1.80 μm), and Kbb (1.97-2.38 μm) bands. The spectra of the two bodies are remarkably similar and imply that both bodies were formed at the same time from the same material; such as via incomplete re-accretion after a major impact on the precursor body.     

HIDDRA: a highly independent data distribution and retrieval architecture for space observation missions

Institutions such as NASA, ESA or JAXA find solutions to distribute data from their missions to the scientific community, and their long term archives. This is a complex problem, as it includes a vast amount of data, several geographically distributed archives, heterogeneous architectures with heterogeneous networks, and users spread around the world. We propose a novel architecture that solves this problem aiming to fulfill the requirements of the final user. Our architecture is a modular system that provides a highly efficient parallel multiprotocol download engine, using a publisher/subscriber policy which helps the final user to obtain data of interest transparently. We have evaluated a first prototype, in collaboration with the ESAC centre in Villafranca del Castillo (Spain) that shows a high scalability and performance, opening a wide spectrum of opportunities.     

Perspectives and challenges for future telescopes

At the celebration of 400 years of telescopic observations, it is appropriate to consider future ground-based facilities enabled by continuing technological developments, and driven by astronomical questions which are amongst the most fundamental in science and are of enormous interest to the general public.     

The need for an energy-dependent torsion-coupling constant in the early Universe

We present arguments to show that torsion-coupling constant (which depends on energy asE ^–2) can pass through the values of the coupling constants of the other interactions during the evolution of the Universe. An energy-dependent torsion-coupling constant helps in a natural way to understand the ratios of the coupling strengths of the different fundamental interactions.