Educational Article

A Space Weather mission concept: Observatories of the Solar Corona and Active Regions (OSCAR)

¹ Département de Physique, Université de Montréal, C.P. 6128 Succ. Centre-Ville, Montréal, QC, H3C-3J7, Canada
² Laboratoire AIM Paris-Saclay, CEA/Irfu Université Paris-Diderot CNRS/INSU, 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette, France
³ Institute of Experimental and Applied Physics, University of Kiel, Kiel, Germany
⁴ Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London, Dorking, United Kingdom
⁵ Institut für Astrophysik, University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria
⁶ FOTEC – Department of Aerospace Engineering, Wiener Neustadt, Austria
⁷ Finnish Meteorological Institute, Helsinki, Finland
⁸ Department of Physics, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
⁹ Royal Observatory of Belgium, Brussels, Belgium
¹⁰ German Aerospace Centre (DLR), Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Cologne, Germany
¹¹ Institut Supérieur de l’Aéronautique et de l’Espace, Toulouse, France
¹² La Sapienza – University of Rome, Italy
¹³ Department of Physics, Free University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany
¹⁴ Danish Space Research Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark
¹⁵ School of Medicine and Medical Sciences, University College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
¹⁶ Dpto. de Astrofísica y CC. de la Atmósfera, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, 28040 Madrid, Spain
¹⁷ Department of Physics, University of Oslo, Norway
¹⁸ ESA/ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands
¹⁹ Space Research Institute, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria

^* Corresponding author: strugarek@astro.umontreal.ca

Received: 28 February 2014
Accepted: 1 September 2014

Abstract

Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) and Corotating Interaction Regions (CIRs) are major sources of magnetic storms on Earth and are therefore considered to be the most dangerous space weather events. The Observatories of Solar Corona and Active Regions (OSCAR) mission is designed to identify the 3D structure of coronal loops and to study the trigger mechanisms of CMEs in solar Active Regions (ARs) as well as their evolution and propagation processes in the inner heliosphere. It also aims to provide monitoring and forecasting of geo-effective CMEs and CIRs. OSCAR would contribute to significant advancements in the field of solar physics, improvements of the current CME prediction models, and provide data for reliable space weather forecasting. These objectives are achieved by utilising two spacecraft with identical instrumentation, located at a heliocentric orbital distance of 1 AU from the Sun. The spacecraft will be separated by an angle of 68° to provide optimum stereoscopic view of the solar corona. We study the feasibility of such a mission and propose a preliminary design for OSCAR.