On January 18, the Sun released a powerful eruption of high-energy particles that reached Earth in a jiff. The eruption caused some of the most intense radiation storms on record, resulting in disturbances to Earth’s magnetic field. Meanwhile, an ice-monitoring satellite had just received a software update to its navigation system, allowing it to observe the impact of the solar storm while also keeping a steady watch on the ice sheets.
For nearly 16 years, the European Space Agency’s (ESA) CryoSat has been measuring the thickness of polar sea ice and monitoring changes in Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. At the end of last year, ESA engineers remotely upgraded the software for one of the satellite’s instruments. The new software allowed CryoSat to measure changes in Earth’s magnetosphere, just in time to observe the aftermath of an intense geomagnetic storm.
CryoSat’s measurements of Earth’s magnetic field are detailed in a study published in Geophysical Research Letters.
CryoSat’s platform magnetometer is designed to ensure the satellite orbits at the right altitude and directs its science instruments toward the right part of Earth’s surface. The instrument was not originally intended to produce scientific data, but a recent software update gave it newfound skills.
The upgrade allowed the magnetometer to measure changes in Earth’s magnetosphere with scientific precision. While CryoSat maintains its original mission of monitoring ice sheets, it can now also work hand-in-hand with other satellites to produce a completely different type of data.
“In essence, we use magnetometers to sense the Earth’s magnetosphere, which then sends signals to the onboard computer to adjust the satellite’s orientation, ensuring it achieves its mission objectives,” Tommaso Parrinello, CryoSat mission manager, said in a statement. “The precision and low noise level of these measurements have led the scientific community to recognize their value as scientific data. Consequently, a new data packet is now generated by the onboard computer for scientific purposes.”
The satellite’s upgraded instrument can now use its data to calibrate its measurements from ESA’s three-satellite Swarm mission, which is dedicated to unraveling the mysteries of Earth’s magnetic field. CryoSat’s platform magnetometer is being used to measure Earth’s stronger external magnetic field variations, providing complementary datasets to other missions.
The newly updated CryoSat instrument was able to put its new skills to use during January’s geomagnetic storm. Over the course of three days, the satellite measured the storm’s intensity and recorded disturbances in Earth’s magnetic field.
The satellite’s new ability to measure changes in the magnetic field and complement data gathered by the Swarm mission adds new depths to scientific research at no additional cost. “This is about leveraging data from an existing system that has been used for the past 16 years to actively control the satellite’s orientation in space,” Parrinello said. “There is lots of exciting science still to come as both missions fly on well beyond their design lifetimes.”
Source: Gizmodo