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| First Name * |
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Luca |
| Last Name * |
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Teriaca |
| Affiliation * |
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Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research |
| Abstract Type * |
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Invited |
| Title * |
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The Spectral Imaging of the Coronal Environment (SPICE) experiment aboard Solar Orbiter: Instrument description, scientific capabilities and possible synergies with IRIS |
| Author(s) * |
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Luca Teriaca and the SPICE Team |
| Abstract Session * |
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Science with future facilities |
| Abstract * |
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Scheduled to launch in February 2020, Solar Orbiter is an ESA/NASA interplanetary mission devoted to the study of the Sun and of the inner heliosphere as a combined system.
After a 22 months cruise phase, the spacecraft will set on a 6 months elliptic orbit with perihelion as close as 0.28 AU to the Sun and with progressively higher inclination over the ecliptic plane so to achieve unprecedented (from up to 34 degrees heliocentric latitude) views of the solar poles. The SPICE ultraviolet imaging spectrometer is part of the scientific payload comprising other five remote sensing and four in-situ instruments: a payload designed and built to “connect” the plasma probed in-situ by the spacecraft to its source regions on the Sun.
With its capability of determine relative abundance, pinpoint mass flows and obtain information on the thermodynamic state of the plasma at the regions on the solar disk that are magnetically linked to the surroundings of the spacecraft, SPICE has an absolutely central role in establishing such a connection. The instrument records lines in two spectral ranges: 70-79 nm and 97-105 nm, chosen for the presence of spectral lines formed at temperatures ranging from those of the upper chromosphere to those of the flaring corona and from ions with both high and low first ionization potential (FIP).
In this contribution I will describe the SPICE instrument and its scientific goals. I will then discuss synergies and opportunities deriving from combined observations with IRIS. |
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