Energetic Particles, Shocks, and Solar Activity (IS/RS)

Leads:

Domenico Trotta, Imperial College London, UK

Olga Malandraki, National Observatory of Athens, Greece

Lynn B. Wilson III, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, USA

Objectives:

• What are the roles of shocks, compressions, waves, and turbulence in the acceleration of energetic particles?

• What are the seed particles for the mechanisms of particle energization? Where and how are the seed particles in suprathermal tails energized?

• How is energy dissipated across collisionless shocks for different shock parameters?

• How do interplanetary shocks and SEP events evolve with heliocentric distance?

• How are the distribution functions of thermal, suprathermal, and high-energy ions inter-related and evolve across shocks and compression regions?

• How are particles heated and energized by various spatial scales within the shock transition and across compression regions?

• Is there any evidence of shocks mediated by energetic particles close to the Sun?

• How do the dynamics of interplanetary shocks with larger spatial extent differ to smaller scale shocks (e.g. planetary bow shocks), and can a comparison to astrophysical shocks be made?

• At what helio-distances do IP shocks form?

• Improvement of our understanding of the origin and transport of energetic particles in the heliosphere, in association with Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) and Corotating Interaction Regions (CIRs) propagation and evolution

• How and where are energetic particles injected at the sources and in particular what are the seed populations for energetic particles?

• How are energetic particles released from their sources and distributed in space and time? (transport radially and across magnetic field lines from the corona in the heliosphere)

• Use of EPD observations to better constrain current particle transport models that describe SEP events – Improvement of existing propagation models;

• Study of the temporal and spatial evolution of energetic particles accelerated by CIRs

• More accurate source identification and timing studies of SEP events - Radio counterparts

• Origin of relativistic ions in Ground Level Enhancement (GLE) events;

• Origin of local particle enhancements in association with coherent structures in the solar wind in the inner heliosphere

• Investigate roles of CME- and SIR-driven interplanetary shocks, solar flares, and other processes in accelerating energetic particles

• Resolve conditions that determine when interplanetary shocks efficiently accelerate energetic particles

• Generation of radio waves throught the interaction of the solar energetic electrons with the ambiant medium (Langmuir wave generation, plasma mode conversion ...)

• Scattering of radio waves by the ambient density fluctuations and turbulence

• Synergy between RPW and ground-based radio observatories

We will actively seek coordination with other missions such as: BepiColombo, PSP, WIND/ACE, MMS, THEMIS, Cluster, STEREO.

Google Group: solo_wg_energetic_particles_shocks_activity