IV: Science investigation

1. IV: Science investigation • Key Observables • Flux emergence and transport (both HMI and AIA) • Magnetic connections among different areas (coronal emission by AIA, helped by views from different perspectives by STEREO/EUVI, magnetic extrapolation on HMI) and their changes • Estimate/calculate magnetic field-related quantities, such as magnetic free energy, helicity, vertical currents, and flux imbalance, of regions of interest (basically HMI) • Infer coronal magnetic field topology (magnetic field extrapolation aided by observations of coronal loops, HMI and AIA), within and beyond active regions, in comparison with various model predictions • Estimate/calculate energy loss due to non-explosive reconnection, perhaps as indications of slow reconnection which may lead to explosive reconnection (AIA, XRT)

2. IV: Science investigation • Key Observables (Cont) • First signatures of transients in the low corona, either continued from gradual evolution or happening within AIA cadence (AIA, XRT, GBO) • Manifestations of transients in the low corona, such as dimming, ejections, waves, flares (AIA, XRT, GBO) • Changes of magnetic field associated with flares and CMEs (HMI) • Diagnosing regions of explosive magnetic reconnection with inflows and outflows (AIA)

3. V: Implementation: general • What do we need to make progress on the science questions in general? • Collect outcomes from individual projects funded by programs like SR&T, TR&T, GI, SHINE, NSWP, etc. They are not necessarily found in literature in a timely fashion. • Publish brief "Science Nuggets" both on a main Web page and in the form of short monthly e-mail notices • Hold frequent workshops, possibly joint with other scheduled meetings • Create working groups, consisting of 5-10 members, within the SDO team who are actively engaged in focused science questions or analysis of particular events (such as top 10 major geomagnetic storms in cycle 23), as part of already funded programs. Mixture of observers and theorists is always desirable.

4. V: Implementation: general • What do we need to make progress on the science questions in general? (Cont.) • Associate scientific investigations on solar transients with space weather and NASA’s exploration initiatives. Use international efforts like IHY, ILWS, etc. to request more funding for interdisciplinary research. Joint with the AIA Geospace team. • The best way may be for us to attend foreign meetings, and also to have sessions on SDO at IHY and other meetings. • We might want to have some specific team members who are assigned to be on organizing committees, and have them coordinate their efforts with the SDO science team leadership • Work with modelers and redefine observables to distinguish the proposed models for CME initiation. Models will take into account a more realistic term of the energy. • Coordinated observations and data analysis with Solar-B and STEREO

5. VI: Implementation: AIA+HMI • What do we need from and for SDO to make progress on our major science? • The default synoptic observations (full-disk images at 10 s cadence) serve most of the observables discussed for transients, as far as AIA is concerned. • For certain purposes, such as finding conjugate foot-points of flare loops, we will need higher cadence. • Insertion of non full-disk images should be done with minimum impact on the synoptic observations. • Automatic exposure control (AEC) can kill observations of large-scale structures (relevant to CMEs). • High cadence (non-full disk) and AEC images should be limited to fewer filters (e.g., 131, 171, 193 and 304A.)

6. VI: Implementation: AIA+HMI • What do we need from and for SDO to make progress on our major science (Cont.) ? • Quick look movies, both in raw and difference images, would be very useful for identifying events to be studied in depth. There should be a tool to make similar movies later using fully calibrated data. • Event lists for dimming, ejections, waves, loop oscillations should be automatically produced, first on a real-time basis, later superseded by calibrated data as they become available. • There should be a systematic validation scheme for magnetic field extrapolations to match coronal emission patterns. Right now, we seem to rely on our general visual inspection. • Expected coronal responses from representative flare/CME models (in crude forms and with continued improvement), easily comparable to AIA images (such tools may exist for RHESSI).

7. VII: AIA (+HMI+EVE) data products • list data products; differentiate ‘critical’, ‘desirable’, ‘useful’ • Full disk movies (raw + running/base difference) with reduced cadence and spatial sampling for quick look purposes but that should be run on any computer platforms. Critical. • These should be 4x4 averaged, so they end up being 1Kx1K images. • Movie maker tool to allow the user to make customized movies. The customization includes selection of wavelengths (not only AIA but also HMI magnetograms), pixel summation / FOV, whether to track a region with solar rotation, etc. Critical • Event lists that contain links to raw data and related movies. Desirable • The catalog can be a Wiki, where anyone could add comments. Might be some protections needed, but if we keep the list decoupled from the actual data, it would be fairly safe.

8. VII: AIA (+HMI+EVE) data products • list data products; differentiate ‘critical’, ‘desirable’, ‘useful’ (Cont.) • Frequently updated synoptic magnetograms from HMI for magnetic field extrapolations. Critical • Browser combining SDO and other data. Both real time and archive. Desirable

9. VIII: AIA (+HMI+EVE) data production • Assessment of required resources/codes/etc: No discussion at the session • [pipeline software] • [analysis software/studies] • [supporting software/models] • [computational requirements (run time estimates, system requirements, …)] • [storage requirements: size, duration, …] • [access: web, archive, logs, search methods, …]

10. IX: Business plan: Resources • What data and codes must we have to make SDO a success (at pipeline, supporting, and research levels)? Who will provide the required codes? • As emphasized above, it is essential to be able to look at data efficiently with various movies, which should be generated both at pipeline and by the user. Lists of automatically detected features are also useful. • It is very important to have summary pages of AIA/HMI observations in comparison with heliospheric/magnetosphetric data as initiated, e.g., in the SolarSoft’s latest event pages. Ideally, the software will be developed by a team that consists of a few representatives or software people from each of the missions (AIA, HMI, SECCHI, XRT, IMPACT, etc.) Often same people represent different missions.

11. IX: Business plan: Resources • What data and codes must we have to make SDO a success (at pipeline, supporting, and research levels)? Who will provide the required codes? (Cont.) • Apart from magnetic field extrapolations based on HMI and simulated emission patterns in the corona, we should probably ask the CME modelers to refine their models, and to predict low coronal observations at early stages of CMEs for given parameters for the drivers. Once we understand more clearly how the models work, some SolarSoft experts can turn them to software with easy user interface so that we can compare model predictions with observations. We use SHINE, LWS-related workshops and similar programs to promote interactions with the modelers

12. X: Business plan: Implementation • Define key milestones, test procedures, and target dates, … • it would be most productive if we understand the low coronal phenomena in terms of theory and know how certain it is. Following the first comparison (SHINE 2000/2001) of models with observations for CME initiation in cycle 23, we need to critically review what have been done so far and what need to be done. Perhaps use future SHINE meetings or the LWS workshop 2007? • Communication: define or list meetings, topical sessions, etc., where progress can be presented, discussed, evaluated, … • Joint SDO – Solar-B meeting on magnetic reconnection? Other space weather-related meetings.