1. Space weather at unmagnetized planets
Planetary and cometary space weather predictions from observations near and far
Andrea Opitz[1], Karoly Szego[1], Zoltan Nemeth[1], Melinda Dosa[1], Zsuzsanna Dalya[1], Aniko Timar[1], Klaudia Szabo[1], Daniel Vech[1,2], and Nicolas Andre[3]  contact:
[1] Wigner Research Centre for Physics, Department of Space Physics and Space Technology, Budapest, Hungary
[2] University of Michigan, USA
[3] IRAP, Toulouse, France
Plasma processes at unmagnetized planets and comets strongly depend on the solar wind properties. Knowledge of space weather conditions around them is hence essential. Since in-situ solar wind observations are not always available, we derive them either indirectly from near planet/comet observations or by extrapolating them from far solar probes.
Space weather at unmagnetized planets
EU Horizon 2020 Europlanet Research Infrastructure:
„Facilities for European planetary scientists."
Planetary Space Weather Services:
"Goal is to develop a new service dedicated to planetary space weather, including new methods, interfaces and functionalities."
Solar wind from near
Solar wind from far
Comets are a special problem of induced magnetospheres. Their plasma environment is highly variable as it strongly depends on both the cometary and the solar activity, with mostly the solar wind pressure determining the shape and size of their magnetosphere. Rosetta magnetic field measurements deep inside the induced cometary magnetosphere make it possible to estimate the dynamic pressure of the solar wind acting on the outside, creating an independent input for space weather propagation (Timar et al. in preparation).
Solar wind plasma measurements by a solar spacecraft or eventually a planetary spacecraft temporarily located in the solar wind can be propagated to any target in the ecliptic plane (Opitz et al. 2010).
Ballistic propagation is a fast and simple way to provide solar wind predictions.
Magnetic lasso propagation uses near Earth solar spacecraft measurements extrapolated to a ring at a distance of 1 AU and searches for the best spiral to the target (Dosa et al. submitted).
At Wigner RCP we validate PSWS predictions, developed the magnetic lasso method and created a solar wind dynamic pressure proxy from near comet observations.
Opitz et al. 2009
References:
Andre et al PSS: "Virtual Planetary Space Weather Services offered by the Europlanet H2020 Research Infrastructure."
Dosa, Opitz et al. (submitted): "Magnetic lasso: an enhanced ballistic propagation method."
Opitz, Karrer et al Solar Physics: "Temporal evolution of the solar wind bulk velocity at solar minimum by correlating the STEREO A and B PLASTIC measurements"
Opitz, Fedorov et al Solar Physics: "Solar wind bulk velocity throughout the inner heliosphere from multi-spaceraft measurements."
Timar, Nemeth et al. (in preparation): "Estimating the solar wind pressure at comet 67P from Rosetta magnetic field measurements."
Image credit: ESA