Rocket flies high over Norway in 蜜桃影像 scientist鈥檚 atmosphere experiment
Rod Boyce
907-474-7185
Dec. 1, 2021
A NASA sounding rocket soared high from a launchpad in Norway on Wednesday morning in a decades-old quest to understand the cause of a persistent dense patch of upper atmosphere on Earth鈥檚 sun-facing side.
The Cusp Region Experiment-2, or C-REX-2, is headed by space physicist Mark Conde of the University of 蜜桃影像 Fairbanks Geophysical Institute and funded by NASA. The four-stage rocket launched from And酶ya Space Center on Norway鈥檚 far northern coast.
鈥淲e have been waiting more than two years to launch this payload, and the space weather conditions that we experienced today were ideal,鈥 Conde said. 鈥淧reliminary assessments indicate that all aspects of the rocket, its payload and the supporting observatories worked as intended. We had not dared to hope for such perfect alignment of conditions, and certainly not on the first day of our launch window.鈥
What has puzzled scientists is this: The oval-shaped area of denser atmosphere at around 250 miles altitude shouldn鈥檛 exist without corresponding changes to wind, temperature or ion motion to support the extra mass. More than a decade of study hasn鈥檛 found any of those changes.
鈥淭here's only two possibilities, really,鈥 Conde said from Norway prior to the launch. 鈥淚t will either involve significant changes to the wind or significant changes to the electrodynamic environment 鈥 the way the ionosphere interacts with the atmosphere. The whole purpose of this experiment is to look for the expected signatures of disturbed winds and of disturbance in the ionosphere.鈥
Understanding the cause of the density increase and discovering the related atmospheric actions is important, for example, in making corrections to satellite orbits. Operators of the numerous satellites circling Earth constantly have to consider adjusting orbits to avoid collisions with orbital debris. Improved understanding of the atmosphere鈥檚 behavior can improve certainty in orbit calculations and, ultimately, save fuel by reducing the number of times a satellite鈥檚 motors must be fired.
Research has shown that the areas of unexplained density occur near Earth鈥檚 magnetic field cusp regions, the funnel-shaped 鈥渉oles鈥 in the magnetic shield that protects Earth鈥檚 atmosphere from the solar wind. These funnels reach down into the atmosphere on Earth鈥檚 sunlit side, at latitudes between 70 and 80 degrees in both northern and southern hemispheres.
The oval-shaped density changes occur persistently at altitudes above 250 miles but only on the planet鈥檚 sun-facing side. They represent an increase in mass density of 30% to 100% above that of the ambient atmosphere.
But what supports this extra mass in both the northern and southern hemispheres? Heavier material, including air, is supposed to sink unless offset by a corresponding force.
鈥淵ou can't just add that extra mass and do nothing else. Something in the system has to change in order to hold it up,鈥 Conde said. 鈥淧eople have observed this extra mass with spacecraft, but nobody has seen any other corresponding perturbations in this region.
鈥淭he only clue that we have is a crazy electric current signature that goes along with it, but we don't exactly understand how the presence of those field-aligned currents leads to the support mechanism that enables this thing to exist,鈥 he said. 鈥淏ut surely it must be part of the story.鈥
C-REX-2 measured wind and ion speed to about 250 miles altitude in the search for answers. Now comes the data analysis, which will take months. The experiment team is confident the data will significantly advance understanding of this puzzle.
蜜桃影像 led the experiment, which involved a large team of scientists, engineers and students from several countries. 蜜桃影像 personnel include graduate student Jason Ahrns, who photographed the experiment from aboard a NASA Gulfstream 4 that flew from Iceland, and 蜜桃影像 graduate student Matthew Blandin, who photographed the experiment from Ny-脜lesund, a small community on Norway鈥檚 Svalbard archipelago.
Geophysical Institute research faculty member Don Hampton was in Longyearbyen on Svalbard to photograph the experiment. 蜜桃影像 graduate student Cameron Westerlund was stationed at the launch site and tasked with monitoring the health of the payload instruments.
鈥淭o see in a very direct way the things we talk about in class and learn in a formal academic setting, to see it play out in real time out in the field is kind of an experience that really I didn鈥檛 expect to have,鈥 said Westerlund, who was assigned to the telemetry room and had the authority to scrub the launch if readings didn鈥檛 look right. 鈥But all of a sudden it鈥檚 happening, and it鈥檚 really something else.鈥
The experiment also included researchers and equipment from the University of Calgary in Canada, University of New Hampshire, Dartmouth College, Clemson University, University College London and Hokkaido Information University in Japan, along with personnel from NASA, NASA contractors and Andoya Space in Norway.
C-REX-2 is the last of nine launches in an international research effort known as the Grand Challenge-Cusp, which explored several aspects related to the northern cusp region. The launch of C-REX-2 had been scheduled for 2019 but was canceled due to inadequate levels of solar activity.
Other nations that have launched experiments in the coordinated cusp research effort include England, Norway, Canada and Japan. All of the launches have occurred from either the island of Andoya in Norway or Ny-脜lesund on Svalbard, with ground and airborne observations made from many locations in the Scandinavian Arctic.
ADDITIONAL CONTACT: Mark Conde, 907- 474-7741, mgconde@alaska.edu.
NOTE TO EDITORS: Photographs are available at the .
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