Open AccessThe Sun's X‐ray Emission During the Recent Solar Minimum
Author(s) -
Sylwester Janusz,
Kowalinski Mirek,
Gburek Szymon,
Siarkowski Marek,
Kuzin Sergey,
Farnik Frantisek,
Reale Fabio,
Phillips Kenneth J. H.
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
eos, transactions american geophysical union
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.316
H-Index - 86
eISSN - 2324-9250
pISSN - 0096-3941
DOI - 10.1029/2010eo080002
Subject(s) - photometer , physics , astronomy , geostationary operational environmental satellite , spectrometer , solar flare , spacecraft , remote sensing , satellite , astrophysics , optics , geography
The Sun recently underwent a period of a remarkable lack of major activity such as large flares and sunspots, without equal since the advent of the space age a half century ago. A widely used measure of solar activity is the amount of solar soft X‐ray emission, but until recently this has been below the threshold of the X‐ray‐monitoring Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES). There is thus an urgent need for more sensitive instrumentation to record solar X‐ray emission in this range. Anticipating this need, a highly sensitive spectrophotometer called Solar Photometer in X‐rays (SphinX) was included in the solar telescope/spectrometer TESIS instrument package on the third spacecraft in Russia's Complex Orbital Observations Near‐Earth of Activity of the Sun (CORONAS‐PHOTON) program, launched 30 January 2009 into a near‐polar orbit. SphinX measures X‐rays in a band similar to the GOES longer‐wavelength channel.