Open AccessUsing Polar‐orbiting Environmental Satellite data to specify the radiation environment up to 1200 km altitude
Author(s) -
O'Brien T. P.,
Mazur J. E.,
Guild T. B.,
Looper M. D.
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
space weather
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.254
H-Index - 56
ISSN - 1542-7390
DOI - 10.1002/2015sw001166
Subject(s) - pathfinder , satellite , remote sensing , payload (computing) , altitude (triangle) , radiation , environmental science , dosimeter , polar orbit , van allen radiation belt , anomaly (physics) , meteorology , polar , particle radiation , computer science , physics , geography , magnetosphere , astronomy , charged particle , optics , magnetic field , computer network , geometry , mathematics , condensed matter physics , quantum mechanics , network packet , library science , ion
Data from the Deal dosimeter payload on the Rapid Pathfinder satellite provide daily maps of the radiation environment on a sphere at 1200 km altitude. Through the use of magnetic coordinates, these dosimeter maps can be projected down to lower altitudes, providing valuable information for satellite anomaly resolution for vehicles in low Earth orbit (LEO). Unfortunately, the Deal data are not widely available, and the mission has a limited lifetime. As an alternative, we present a method to estimate the Deal daily maps using belt index data from NOAA's Polar‐orbiting Environmental Satellite (POES) vehicles. The method addresses only trapped radiation but could readily be supplemented with POES's own measurements of solar particle radiation reaching LEO.