RESEARCHERS AT ABERYSTWYTH ABER-SSP

Marianna Brigitta Korsos

A Post-Doctoral Research Assistant at Aberystwyth university.


Email: mak102@aber.ac.uk

Projects

Solar Flare Prediction

Marianna Korsos> The interactions of solar activity with Earth’s upper atmosphere manifest through a complex series of events commonly known as Space Weather. From these events, the most energetic ones are the flare and CME eruptions. These two, as well as the largest, solar explosions in the entire Solar System often result in rather dramatic consequences for the functioning of a number of ground- (e.g. pipelines, power lines) and space-based infrastructures and services (satellites, communication, GPS) as they may be seriously damaged. These societal assets and services are vital to the economic welfare and security of every citizen. Considerable failures due to flares and CMEs have indeed befallen in the past (e.g. Quebec, Canada suffered an electrical power blackout in 1989, two Erik satellites lost, etc.).

The importance of Space Weather forecasting is rapidly increasing because of the impact solar eruptions may have on the entire (near-)terrestrial environment and the rising sensitivity of our technosphere. Our aim is to develope a flare intensity and onset time prediction tool that is substantially more precise than those currently available. Most flare and CME forecast methods are applied on the solar surface, however they occur in the solar atmosphere. Therefore, in our project, we apply and critically assess a new measure for predicting eruptive non-potentiality in solar active regions by utilising 3D magnetic mapping across the solar atmosphere. To achieve a leap forward, here, we generalise our forecasting methods by applying them through the solar atmosphere in order to determine an optimum height range in the lower solar atmosphere for predicting flares and CMEs.