The Applied Physics
Laboratory will develop and operate twin NASA
spacecraft to study how the sun interacts with Earth's
radiation belts.
Part of NASA's Living With a Star program, the
Radiation Belt Storm Probes mission will determine how
varying inputs of solar energy form or change populations
of relativistic electrons and ions in the Earth's radiation
belts — the doughnut-shaped bands of charged
particles trapped by Earth's magnetic field that extend
some 20,000 miles around the planet. After launch,
scheduled for 2012, the spacecraft will measure the
distributions of charged particles as well as the electric
and magnetic fields that energize, transport or remove the
particles within these belts.
Detailed design of the probes will begin this summer,
after NASA selects the spacecraft's science instruments.
The mission's science results will provide the
understanding needed to predict potentially hazardous space
weather effects, in much the same way weather is forecast
on Earth. Furthermore, observations from the spacecraft
will be used to improve the characterization of planetary
space environments. Increased knowledge of the space
environment and effects of space weather will permit better
design and operations of new technology on Earth and in
space.
"For the first time, several spacecraft will
simultaneously watch activity on the sun and the reaction
to that activity within Earth's radiation belts," said Ken
Potocki, APL's Living With a Star program manager. "These
probes will have to work in an incredibly difficult
radiation environment where charging and discharging will
occur, a lot like flying into an electrical storm."
Radiation Belt Storm Probes is the first project
assigned to APL under a 12-year contract, awarded in
December 2000, to design, develop and operate missions in
the Living With a Star and Solar Terrestrial Probes
programs.
For more information on the Living With a Star
program, go to
lws.gsfc.nasa.gov.
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