Quite recently, it has been suggested that the interaction of the solar wind with Mercury results in the variation in the solar wind velocity in the Earth’s neighborhood during inferior conjunctions with Mercury. This suggestion has important implications both on the plasma physics of the interplanetary space and on the space weather forecast. In this study we have attempted to answer a question of whether the claim is properly tested. We confirm that there are indeed ups and downs in the profile of the solar wind velocity measured at the distance of 1 AU from the Sun. However, the characteristic attribute of the variation in the solar wind velocity during the inferior conjunctions with Mercury is found to be insensitive to the phase of the solar cycles, contrary to an earlier suggestion. We have found that the cases of the superior conjunctions with Mercury and of even randomly chosen data sets rather result in similar features. Cases of Venus are also examined, where it is found that the ups and downs with a period of ~ 10 to 15 days can be also seen. We conclude, therefore, that those variations in the solar wind velocity turn out to be a part of random fluctuations and have nothing to do with the relative position of inner planets. At least, one should conclude that the solar wind velocity is not a proper observable modulated by inner planets at the distance of 1 AU from the Sun in the Earth’s neighborhood during inferior conjunctions.
Variabilities in the solar wind cause disturbances throughout the heliosphere on all temporal and spatial scales, which leads to changeable space weather. As a view of space weather forecasting, in particular, it is important to know direct and indirect causes modulating the space environment near the Earth in advance. Recently, there are discussions on a role of the interaction of the solar wind with Mercury in affecting the solar wind velocity in the Earth’s neighborhood during its inferior conjunctions. In this study we investigate a question of whether other parameters describing the space environment near the Earth are modulated by the inner planets’ wake, by examining whether the interplanetary magnetic field and the proton density in the solar wind observed by the Advanced Composition Explorer (ACE) spacecraft, and the geomagnetic field via the Dst index and Auroral Electrojet index (AE index) are dependent upon the relative position of the inner planets. We find there are indeed apparent variations. For example, the mean variations of the geomagnetic fields measured in the Earth’s neighborhood apparently have varied with a timescale of about 10 to 25 days. Those variations in the parameters we have studied, however, turn out to be a part of random fluctuations and have nothing to do with the relative position of inner planets. Moreover, it is found that variations of the proton density in the solar wind, the Dst index, and the AE index are distributed with the Gaussian distribution. Finally, we point out that some of properties in the behavior of the random fluctuation are to be studied.
We present preliminary observations of the field-aligned-irregularities (FAIs) in the E and F regions during the solar minimum (2009 - 2010) using the 40.8 MHz coherent backscatter radar at Daejeon (36.18°N, 127.14°E, 26.7°N dip latitude) in South Korea. The radar, which consists of 24 Yagi antennas, observes the FAIs using a single beam with a peak power of 24 kW. The radar has been continuously operated since December 2009. Depending on the manner of occurrence of the backscatter echoes, the E-region echoes are largely divided into two types: quasi-periodic (QP) and continuous echoes. Our observations show that the QP echoes occur frequently above an altitude of 105 km in the post-sunset period and continuous echoes occur preferentially around an altitude of 105 km in the post-sunrise period. QP echoes appear as striated discrete echoes for a period of about 10 - 20 min. The QP-type echoes occur more frequently than the continuoustype echoes do and the echo intensity of the QP type is stronger than that of the continuous type. In the F region, the FAIs occur at night at an altitude interval of 250 - 450 km. As time proceeds, the occurrence height of the FAIs gradually increases until early in the morning and then decreases. The duration of the F-region FAIs is typically a few hours at night, although, in rare cases, FAIs persist throughout the night or appear even after sunrise. We discuss the similarities and differences of the FAIs observed by the Daejeon radar in comparison with other radar observations.
There has been a rapid increase of the concern on the space radiation effect on pilots, crew and passengers at the commercial aircraft altitude (~ 10 km) recently. It is because domestic airline companies, Korean Air and Asiana Airlines have just begun operating the polar routes over the North Pole since 2006 and 2009 respectively. CARI-6 and CARI-6M are commonly used space radiation estimation programs which are provided officially by the U.S. federal aviation administration (FAA). In this paper, the route doses and the annual radiation doses for Korean pilots and cabin crew were estimated by using CARI-6M based on 2012 flight records. Also the modeling concept was developed for our own space radiation estimation program which is composed of GEANT4 and NRLMSIS00 models. The GEANT4 model is used to trace the incident particle transports in the atmosphere and the NRLMSIS00 model is used to get the background atmospheric densities of various neutral atoms at the aircraft altitude. Also presented are the results of simple integration tests of those models and the plan to include the space weather variations through the solar proton event (SPE) prediction model such as UMASEP and the galactic cosmic ray (GCR) prediction model such as Badhwar-O’Neill 2010.
This paper describes an experimental approach to evaluate the effective doses of space radiations at high-altitude by combining the measured data from the Liulin-6K spectrometer loaded onto the air-borne RC-800 cockpit and the calculated data from CARI-6M code developed by FAA. In this paper, 15 exposed dose experiments for the flight missions at a highaltitude above 10 km and 3 experiments at a normal altitude below 4 km were executed over the Korean Peninsula in 2012. The results from the high-altitude flight measurements show a dramatic change in the exposed doses as the altitude increases The effective dose levels (an average of 15.27 μSv) of aircrew at the high-altitude are an order of magnitude larger than those (an average of 0.30 μSv) of the normal altitude flight. The comparison was made between the measure dose levels and the calculated dose levels and those were similar each other. It indicates that the annual dose levels of the aircrew boarding RC- 800 could be above 1 mSv. These results suggest that a proper procedure to manage the exposed dose of aircrew is required for ROK Air Force.
The Earth is not perfectly spherical and its rotational axis is not fixed in space, and these geophysical and kinematic irregularities work as dominant perturbations in satellite orbit propagation. The International Earth Rotation Service (IERS) provides the Conventions as guidelines for using the Earth’s model and the reference time and coordinate systems defined by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). These guidelines are directly applied to model orbital dynamics of Earth satellites. In the present work, the effects of the latest conventions released in 2010 on orbit propagation are investigated by comparison with cases of applying the previous guidelines, IERS Conventions (2003). All seven major updates are tested, i.e., for the models of the precession/nutation, the geopotential, the ocean tides, the ocean pole tides, the free core nutation, the polar motion, and the solar system ephemeris. The resultant position differences for one week of orbit propagation range from tens of meters for the geopotential model change from EGM96 to EGM2008 to a few mm for the precession/nutation model change from IAU2000 to IAU2006. The along-track differences vary secularly while the cross-track components show periodic variation. However, the radial-track position differences are very small compared with the other components in all cases. These phenomena reflect the variation of the ascending node and the argument of latitude. The reason is that the changed models tested in the current study can be regarded as small fluctuations of the geopotential model from the point of view of orbital dynamics. The ascending node and the argument of latitude are more sensitive to the geopotential than the other elements. This study contributes to understanding of the relation between the Earth’s geophysical properties and orbital motion of satellites as well as satellite-based observations.
In this work, the preliminary analysis on both the tracking schedule and measurements characteristics for the spacecraft on the phase of lunar transfer and capture is performed. To analyze both the tracking schedule and measurements characteristics, lunar transfer and capture phases’ optimized trajectories are directly adapted from former research, and eleven ground tracking facilities (three Deep Space Network sties, seven Near Earth Network sites, one Daejeon site) are assumed to support the mission. Under these conceptual mission scenarios, detailed tracking schedules and expected measurement characteristics during critical maneuvers (Trans Lunar Injection, Lunar Orbit Insertion and Apoap¬sis Adjustment Maneuver), especially for the Deajeon station, are successfully analyzed. The orders of predicted measurements’ variances during lunar capture phase according to critical maneuvers are found to be within the order of mm/s for the range and micro-deg/s for the angular measurements rates which are in good agreement with the recommended values of typical measurement modeling accuracies for Deep Space Networks. Although preliminary navigation accuracy guidelines are provided through this work, it is expected to give more practical insights into preparing the Korea’s future lunar mission, especially for developing flight dynamics subsystem.
Since Rigollet first discovered a comet in 1939, many follow-up observations have been made, particularly in Europe. It is now known that the Rigollet comet is identical with the one observed by Herschel in 1788, and thus it is now called 35P/1939 O1 or the Herschel-Rigollet comet. Yumi, a Japanese astronomer, also observed the Rigollet comet in Korea using a 6-inch refractor telescope, and published his data in two Japanese journals (Bulletin of the Observatory of the Government-General of Korea and Publication of the Lecture on Meteorology). In his paper, Yumi also referred to observations by Hirose and Kanda in Japan. However, their works have not been given attention by international society. In this study, we analyze the observation data of Yumi and present preliminary orbital elements using it with a modified Gauss method. We expect that this study will be used to refine the orbital elements of the Rigollet comet by orbital-calculation experts. For that reason, we have also transcribed all the observational data presented by Yumi.
The next generation small satellite-1 (NEXTSat-1) program has been kicked off in 2012, and it will be launched in 2016 for the science missions and the verification of space core technologies. The payloads for these science missions are the Instrument for the Study of Space Storms (ISSS) and NIR Imaging Spectrometer for Star formation history (NISS). The ISSS and the NISS have been developed by Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) and Korea Astronomy and Space science Institute (KASI) respectively. The ISSS detects plasma densities and particle fluxes of 10 MeV energy range near the Earth and the NISS uses spectrometer. In order to verify the spacecraft core technologies in the space, the total of 7 space core technologies (SCT) will be applied to the NEXTSat-1 for space verification and those are under development. Thus, the operation modes for the ISSS and the NISS for space science missions and 7 SCTs for technology missions are analyzed for the required operation time during the NEXTSat-1’s mission life time of 2 years. In this paper, the operational concept of the NEXTSat-1’s science missions as well as the verification of space core technologies are presented considering constraints of volume, mass, and power after launch.
A package of space science instruments, dubbed the Instruments for the Study of Space Storms (ISSS), is proposed for the Next Generation Small Satellite-1 (NEXTSat-1), which is scheduled for launch in May 2016. This paper describes the instrument designs and science missions of the ISSS. The ISSS configuration in NEXTSat-1 is as follows: the space radiation monitoring instruments consist of medium energy particle detector (MEPD) and high energy particle detector (HEPD); the space plasma instruments consist of a Langmuir probe (LP), a retarding potential analyzer (RPA), and an ion drift meter (IDM). The space radiation monitoring instruments (MEPD and HEPD) measure electrons and protons in parallel and perpendicular directions to the geomagnetic field in the sub-auroral region, and they have a minimum time resolution of 50 msec for locating the region of the particle interactions with whistler mode waves and electromagnetic ion cyclotron (EMIC) waves. The MEPD measures electrons and protons with energies of tens of keV to ~400 keV, and the HEPD measures electrons with energies of ~100 keV to > ~1 MeV and protons with energies of ~10 MeV. The space plasma instruments (LP, RPA, and IDM) observe irregularities in the low altitude ionosphere, and the results will be compared with the scintillations of the GPS signals. In particular, the LP is designed to have a sampling rate of 50 Hz in order to detect these small-scale irregularities.
The NISS onboard NEXTSat-1 is being developed by Korea astronomy and space science institute (KASI). For the study of the cosmic star formation history, the NISS performs the imaging spectroscopic observation in the near-infrared range for nearby galaxies, low background regions, star-forming regions and so on. It is designed to cover a wide field of view (2 × 2 deg) and a wide wavelength range from 0.95 to 3.8 μm by using linear variable filters. In order to reduce the thermal noise, the telescope and the infrared sensor are cooled down to 200 K and 80 K, respectively. Evading a stray light outside the field of view and making the most use of limited space, the NISS adopts the off-axis reflective optical system. The primary and the secondary mirrors, the opto-mechanical part and the mechanical structure are designed to be made of aluminum material. It reduces the degradation of optical performance due to a thermal variation. This paper presents the study on the conceptual design of the NISS.
The atmospheric flow in the 3-Cell model of global atmosphere circulation is described by the Lagrange's equation of the non-inertial frame where pressure force, frictional force and fictitious force are mixed in complex form. The Coriolis force is an important factor which requires calculation of fictitious force effects on atmospheric flow viewed from the rotating Earth. We make new Mathematica platform to solve Lagrange's equation by numerical analysis in order to analyze dynamics of atmospheric general circulation in the non-inertial frame. It can simulate atmospheric circulation process anywhere on the earth. It is expected that this pedagogical platform can be utilized to help students studying the atmospheric flow understand the mechanisms of atmospheric global circulation.