MIST
Principal contact: Gary Abel (gaab@bas.ac.uk)
The MIST (Magnetosphere, Ionosphere, Solar Terrestrial) spring meeting will provide a forum for the presentation and discussion of recent advances in all areas of MIST science. The MIST community is interested in physical processes within the Sun-Earth system and other planets. This includes studies of the mesosphere, ionosphere, thermosphere and magnetosphere of the Earth and of other planets and the solar wind.
Taking advantage of the MIST meeting's integration with the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science there will be a number of sessions exploring common themes between MIST science and Astronomy and Solar Physics. These themes include particle acceleration and transport, magnetic reconnection, MHD seismology, and the unusual solar minimum of 2007-2008. In addition there will be a Missions Forum looking at current and future missions in the fields of Solar Physics and Solar Terrestrial Physics.
Scientific Programme
| Monday 20th April | Plenaries including | |
| 11:00 | Magnetoseismology: Remote Sensing the Earth's Magnetosphere Using MHD Waves | Frederick Menk |
| 11:30 | Modulation of NTC frequencies by Pc5 ULF Pulsations: Experimental test of the generation Mechanism and Magnetoseismology of the Emitting Surface | Clair Foullon |
| 11:45 | Sounding of Space Plasma with ULF Waves: Lessons from the Earth's Magnetosphere | Evgeny Fedorov |
| 12:00 | An Empirical Model for Pi3/Pc5 Parameters at High Latitudes | Nadezda Yagova |
| 12:15 | Studying Ganymede's Magnetosphere with ULF Waves. | Martin Volwerk |
| Monday 20th April | MIST Planetary Session | |
| 14:00 | Negative ions at Titan and Enceladus: recent results | Andrew Coates |
| 14:15 | The Saturnian ring current as revealed through plasma, energetic particle and magnetic field measurements | Stephanie Kellett |
| 14:30 | Search for a cushion region at Saturn | Daniel Went |
| 14:45 | Electron Optical Study of the Venus Express ASPERA-4 Electron Spectrometer (ELS) Top-Hat Electrostatic analyser | Glyn Collinson |
| 15:00 | A Preliminary Review of Ionospheric Photoelectrons at Venus | Sharon Tsang |
| 15:15 | Ionospheric photoelectrons as tracers of magnetic field lines in Titan's plasma environment | Andrew Coates |
| Monday 20th April | Magnetic Reconnection (with UKSP) | |
| 16:30 | A comparison of 2D PIC simulations of collisionless magnetic reconnection in sheared and unsheared current sheets | Thomas Neukirch |
| 16:45 | Magnetosonic Mach number dependence of the efficiency of reconnection between the interplanetary and terrestrial magnetic fields | Adrian Grocott |
| 17:00 | Oscillatory Reconnection driven nonlinear fast magnetoacoustic wave propagation in the neighbourhood of a 2D magnetic X-point | James McLaughlin |
| 17:15 | Interchange reconnection signatures in the solar wind linked to eruption from an active region inside a coronal hole - STEREO, ACE and Hinode data combined | Deborah Baker |
| 17:30 | Effect of non-uniform resistivity on forced magnetic reconnection | Mykola Gordovskyy |
| 17:45 | The nature of separator reconnection | Andrew Haynes |
| 18:00 | Poster Session | |
| All poster authors are asked to stand by their posters to discuss their work | ||
| Tuesday 21st April | Particle Acceleration I (with UKSP) | |
| 11:00 | Solar acceleration and transport of energetic particles - observations (Review Talk) | Lyndsay Fletcher |
| 11:20 | Particle acceleration in solar flares - An overview of theoretical ideas (Review Talk) | Thomas Neukirch |
| 11:30 | Investigation of acceleration sources of the major SEP event on 13 December 2006 | Chuan Li |
| 11:55 | Effect of polarisation electric field on particles acceleration in a reconnecting current sheet | Taras Siversky |
| 12:10 | Detecting and interpreting Quiet Sun energetic neutrons in the inner heliosphere | Alex MacKinnon |
| 12:25 | Poster Reports | |
| Tuesday 21st April | MIST Particle Acceleration/MIST General Session | |
| 14:00 | Non stationarity of a collision-less quasi-perpendicular shock: consequences for particle acceleration | Christian Mazelle |
| 14:20 | Electron Acceleration at Quasi-perpendicular Shocks | David Burgess |
| 14:40 | Using CLUSTER II to investigate the dissipation/dispersion range of solar wind turbulence | Khurom Kiyani |
| 14:55 | Radio wave heating of the plasma in the polar mesosphere: diagnosis using cross-modulation | Andrew Senior |
| 15:10 | Resonant Absorption with 2D Variation of Field Line Eigenfrequencies | Alexander Russell |
| 15:25 | Poster Reports | |
| Tuesday 21st April | MIST General Session | |
| 16:00 | Constraining substorm onset with space- and ground-based observations | Andrew Walsh |
| 16:15 | Splitting arcs and sharp boundaries in the ASK imager | Mina Ashrafi |
| 16:30 | Effects of current system scale size and location on the curlometer | Colin Forsyth |
| 16:45 | Combined Electric and Magnetic field measurements in the Medium and Extremely Low freqeuncy bands | Toby Whitley |
| 17:00 | The eigenfrequency and eigenfrequency variation of the IAR observed by multiple observatories | Kai Yuan |
| 17:15 | The effect of a purely growing mode in analyses of incoherent scatter spectra | Hannah Vickers |
| Wednesday 22nd April | The unusual (?) solar minimum I (with UKSP) | |
| 11:00 | When did Solar Cycle 23 go wrong?(Review Talk) | Keith Strong |
| 11:20 | Stark differences between solar activity data and oscillation frequencies observed in BiSON data | Anne-Marie Broomhall |
| 11:35 | Observational periodicities of sunspots and background magnetic fields and their role in the future prediction | Valentina Zharkova |
| 11:50 | Open solar flux and irradiance during the current exceptional solar minimum: implications for reconstruction of past solar variability (Review Talk) | Mike Lockwood |
| 12:10 | Heliospheric observations of a deep solar minimum (Review Talk) | Mathew Owens |
| Wednesday 22nd April | The unusual (?) solar minimum II (with MIST) | |
| 14:00 | The 3D heliosphere at the minimum of Solar Cycle 23 | Robert Forsyth |
| 14:15 | Monitoring the first-light spectra from SphinX on Koronas-Photon during the present solar minimum | Kenneth Phillips |
| 14:30 | The solar cycle, the mean global temperature and solar irradiance | Arnold Wolfendale |
| Wednesday 22nd April | From the Sun to the Earth (with UKSP) | |
| 14:45 | Simultaneous Interplanetary Scintillation and STEREO Heliospheric Imager observations of coronal mass ejections and stream interaction regions | Andy Breen |
| 15:00 | Flux Rope Eruption From the Sun to the Earth: What do reversals in the azimuthal magnetic field gradient tell us about the evolution of the magnetic structure? | Kimberley Steed |
| 15:15 | The apparent layered structure of the heliospheric current sheet: multi-spacecraft observations | Claire Foullon |
| Wednesday 22nd April | Solar/STP Missions Forum (with UKSP) | |
| STP space missions | ||
| 16:00 | Cluster, THEMIS, MMS, Cross-Scale (inc. 10m questions/discussion) | Christopher Owen |
| Solar wind in situ and solar remote | ||
| 16:20 | STEREO, Solar Orbiter (inc. 5m questions/discussion) | Richard Harrison |
| Solar wind in situ and solar remote | ||
| 16:35 | SOHO extended mission, Solar Probe Plus | Andrzej Fludra |
| 16:45 | Hinode and Solar C (inc 5m questions/discussion) | Louise Harra |
| 16:55 | RHESSI, Coronas-Photon/TESIS and SphinX | Kenneth Phillips |
| 17:00 | ILWS/SDO | Robert Walsh |
| Ground-based solar and STP | ||
| 17:05 | ROSA, ATST, EST | Mihalis Mathioudakis Sarah Matthews |
| 17:10 | EISCAT | Stephen Crothers |
| 17:15 | Questions and discussion on ground-based | |
| 17:20 | General discussion on future priorities for Solar/STP missions and facilities | |
| Thursday 23rd April | Heliospheric and astrospheric structure and planetary interactions | |
| 11:00 | Opening remarks | Andy Breen Mario Bisi Helmut Lammer |
| 11:02 | Using the heliosphere as an astrophysical laboratory | Mike Hapgood |
| 11:32 | Stellar wind interaction with close-in extrasolar planets | Erik Johansson |
| 11:51 | Solar wind interactions seen with the STEREO Heliospheric Imagers | Christopher Davis |
| 12:10 | Evolution of large scale solar wind structures from the Sun to 1 AU from remote sensing and in-situ observations | Robert Forsyth |
| 12:29 | Closing remarks | Andy Breen Mario Bisi Helmut Lammer |
MIST Sessions
MHD seismology of solar, space and astrophysical plasmas
Organisers: I. De Moortel (St. Andrews, UK), M. Mathioudakis (QUB, UK), V. Nakariakov (Warwick, UK), M. Volwerk (Graz, Austria)
See main Page here
Magnetic Reconnection
This is a joint session between MIST and UKSP and is open to any papers discussing magnetic reconnection - theoretical or observational - in space, solar and astrophysical plasmas.
Particle acceleration and transport in the heliosphere and beyond
Energetic particles are universally observed at the variety of astronomical scales: from extragalactic jets through supernova explosions down to Earth's ionosphere. The myriad of spacecrafts orbiting the Earth and traveling in the interplanetary space provide us with unprecedented quality observations of the Sun, heliosphere and various astrophysical objects in a broad range of energies with the angular resolution never available before: from gamma rays, through Xrays, UV/optical, radio and can detect particles directly in interplanetary space. Although the spatial and temporal scales are different, the questions how energetic particles acceleration are evenly vital for various astrophysical communities.
Organisers: E. Kontar (Glasgow, UK) V. Zharkova (Bradford, UK) and D. Burgess (Queen Mary, UK) S. Chapman (Warwick, UK)
The unusual(?) solar minimum of 2007-2008
Ongoing observations of both solar and heliospheric phenomena are revealing that the current solar minimum at the end of solar cycle 23 is remarkably different from any other during the past 40 years. This period corresponds approximately to the era of modern space and ground-based observational techniques and it is more difficult to tell whether similar minima are common on longer timescales of solar activity. The present polar photospheric magnetic field strength is almost half of the typical value from recent cycles, polar coronal holes are less well formed and show evidence of a lower temperature, the strength of the heliospheric magnetic field at 1 AU is about a third lower than previous minima, and the dynamic pressure of the solar wind is of the order of 20% lower than the previous cycle at all latitudes, the weakest it has been during the era of in-situ spacecraft measurements. This session will aim to attract observational studies of both the solar and heliospheric aspects of this unusual minimum and papers attempting to interpret and explain what is happening. Can we tell if this solar minimum is indicative of a longer term change in solar activity or simply an outlier on the broad spectrum of solar activity variations?
Organisers: R. Forsyth (Imperial, UK), S. Matthews (MSSL, UK)
Heliospheric and astrospheric structure and planetary interactions
The aim of the session is to bring together the communities studying solar wind structure and solar wind/planetary interaction in the solar system and those working on astrosphere/exoplanet coupling. Results from new heliospheric missions (particularly STEREO) and improvements in ground-based observations are providing an entirely new view of the development of heliospheric structure, while Venus Express and Messenger are yielding detailed information on solar wind/planetary coupling in the inner regions of the heliosphere. The physical processes controlling the development of heliospheric structure solar wind-planetary interaction, as well as many of the phenomena observed in the solar system will also be found in the development of structure in astrospheres and their the interaction of those structures with exoplanets. The aim of this session is to bring together the communities studying solar wind structure and planetary interaction and the exoplanets community, using the new results for the solar system to help understand stellar wind/planetary coupling in other systems. At the same time, the diversity of exoplanetary systems will encourage new ways of thinking about how these processes operate in different environments and how this casts light on heliospheric/planetary interaction in the solar system. All researchers who are interested in the Sun-heliosphere-planetary connection are invited to participate and to contribute to this session, and we would especially like to invite those working on astrosphere/exoplanetary analogues of heliospheric/planetary coupling.
Organisers: A. Breen (Aberystwyth, UK), M. Bisi (University of California, USA), H. Lammer (Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria)
MIST General Session
This session welcomes any papers on any topic of interest to the MIST community not covered by any specialist sessions.
