SwRI-built solar wind plasma sensor to help track space weather

October 2, 2024 - The Southwest Research Institute-developed Solar Wind Plasma Sensor (SWiPS) has been delivered and integrated into a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite dedicated to tracking space weather. SWiPS will measure the properties of ions originating from the Sun, including the very fast ions associated with coronal mass ejections that interact with the Earth's magnetic environment.

NOAA's Space Weather Follow On-Lagrange 1 (SWFO-L1) satellite will orbit the Sun at approximately a million miles from Earth, at a point known as L1. The satellite will remotely image the Sun and make local measurements of the solar wind, high-energy particles and the interplanetary magnetic field. SwRI not only developed SWiPS but also will support operations and data analysis, with the goal of providing advance warning of space weather events. These phenomena can affect technology such as GPS and power grids as well as the safety of astronauts who could be exposed to high levels of radiation.

"The delivery and integration of SWiPS is the culmination of four years of hard work by a very dedicated and talented team. I couldn't be prouder of this group," said Dr. Robert Ebert, a staff scientist in SwRI's Space Science Division and SWiPS principal investigator. "The measurements made by SWiPS will provide advance warning in real-time of phenomena associated with space weather before they arrive in the space environment near Earth."

SWiPS was successfully integrated with the SWFO-L1 spacecraft, which is now undergoing environmental testing. Measurements of the solar wind ion velocity, density and temperature provided by SWiPS, along with information from the SWFO-L1 magnetometer, also built by SwRI, will allow NOAA to predict the severity of geomagnetic storms.

"The SWiPS sensor design is based on the Ion and Electron Sensor flown on ESA's comet mission, Rosetta," said SwRI's Prachet Mokashi, the SWiPS project manager. "The compact design, low resource requirements and advanced data production make this instrument optimal for the SWFO-L1 and other similar missions."

A traditional strength of SwRI's Space Science Division is the design and fabrication of instruments to measure space plasmas. These dilute ionized gases populate the immediate space environments of the Earth and other solar system bodies as well as interplanetary space.

The SWiPS project started shortly after staff from SwRI and other organizations were urged to work primarily from home due to COVID-19. "Designing and developing a complex instrument such as this was especially challenging when we couldn't get the engineers in the same room, and supply chains were disrupted. But we persevered to build the flight instrument and successfully test it before delivery to NASA," said Michael Fortenberry, the system engineer for SWiPS and a director in the Space Systems Division at SwRI.

NASA, which manages the mission for NOAA, plans to launch SWFO-L1 in 2025 as a rideshare with the Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) mission on a SpaceX launch vehicle. SwRI also plays a key role in that mission, managing the payload and providing a scientific instrument to help analyze and map particles streaming from the edge of interstellar space and to help understand particle acceleration near Earth.

For more information, visit Heliophysics or contact Deb Schmid, +1 210 522 2254, Communications Department, Southwest Research Institute, 6220 Culebra Road, San Antonio, TX 78238-5166.

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