Summer 2012 REU Projects

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Project type and supervisor
  Project title and brief description
(Click title for details)
Explosive Flare
Data analysis with 
Adam Kobelski
and
Roger Scott
  Probing Magnetic Reconnection with Active Region Transient Brightenings
Solar magnetic reconnection happens on a variety of scales. Active Region Transient Brightenings (ARTBs) are small scale energy release events governed by magnetic reconnection. Student will search these events using soft X-ray observations by SXT and XRT, and analyze and model these events as a bundle of unresolved strands formed and heated independently.

partitioned magnetogram
Data analysis with 
Dana Longcope 
  Computing the Magnetic Energy of the Sun's Magnetic Field
Solar flares occur when a large amount of magnetic energy is converted into plasma thermal and kinetic energies. The amount of this energy stored in the Sun's magnetic field must be calculated by extrapolating the magnetic field from the photosphere upward. In this project the student will use a new technique to trace the magnetic field lines visible in an EUV image, from the SDO spacecraft, and then use these to compute an estimate of the magnetic energy.
 flare loops
Modeling with 
Dana Longcope  and Sean Brannon
  Evaporation Driven by Thermal Conduction
Fast magnetic reconnection releases energy by shortening magnetic flux tubes rapidly, thereby rapidly compressing the plasma they contain. This compression is rapid enough to be super-sonic and thus generates a shock, the most well-known feature of fast magnetic reconnection. Thermal conduction moving ahead of the propagating shock can drive evaporation from the chromosphere and transition region. In this project, we will use a one-dimensional hydrodynamic code to explore the effect of magnetic field geometry at the lower-atmosphere on evaporative upflows driven by shock-initiated thermal conduction fronts.
current sheet
Data analysis with 
David McKenzie
  Study of Sheet Structures in Eruptive Solar Flares
Observations of high-energy emission from solar flares often reveal the presence of large sheet-like structures, sometimes extending over a space comparable to the Sun's radius. These sheets exist in a very important region where the magnetic field is expected to produce large sheets of electrical current. In this project, we will measure the physical conditions in sheets to understand how these conditions control the magnetic reconnection and energy release in flares.

Flare
reconnection model and flare observations
Data analysis with 
Jiong Qiu 
  Inferring Magnetic Reconnection from UV Signatures in Flares
Flares are spectacular energy release events governed by magnetic reconnection. The student will study the evolution of flare radiation signatures at the foot-points of magnetic tubes (loops) formed during reconnection, measure parameters of magnetic reconnection, and search for better understanding of the relationship between magnetic reconnection and energization of plasmas or particles in flux tubes.

SSEL Activities
Hardware development with 
David Klumpar 
  Space Hardware Development: Space Flight Systems for Space Science
MSU's Space Science and Engineering Laboratory (SSEL) involves students in highly responsible roles in science and engineering associated with the development of space flight systems for scientific applications. The student(s) will develop spaceflight hardware through design, development, and testing as a member of an interdisciplinary project student team. Participants must be U.S. citizens.