The Japanese/US/UK mission called Yohkoh (Japanese for
"sunbeam") carried four scientific instruments: the
Soft X-ray Telescope (SXT), Hard X-ray Telescope
(HXT), Bragg Crystal Spectrometer (BCS), and Wide
Band Spectrometer (WBS). The US Principal
Investigator for SXT was Prof.
Loren Acton, now at MSU. Under Professor Acton's
leadership, the MSU group played a very active role
in the Mission Operations & Data Analysis for
Yohkoh. Ten past & present members of the
MSU Solar Group--faculty and graduate students--participated in the day-to-day
operations of SXT and the Yohkoh spacecraft,
making frequent trips to ISAS,
up until the end of the operational phase of the
mission.
I participated in the day-to-day operation and scientific utilization of the
NASA Transition Region And Coronal Explorer (TRACE) mission, until its end in the summer of 2010.
This battery of 4 ultraviolet telescopes, launched in 1998, provided
spectacular observations of the thin and dynamic interface
region at the base of the corona. This region is also the
source of much of the ionizing radiation that determines the
properties of the upper atmosphere of the earth, such as the
ionosphere and the ozone layer.
Known as "Solar-B" prior to launch, Hinode is a follow-on to the very successful Yohkoh
("Solar-A") mission. As a Co-Investigator on the X-Ray Telescope (XRT) for
Hinode, I coordinate the MSU team's participation in the Hinode Mission
Operations & Data Analysis. Other MSU Solar Group members involved in
XRT operations include Dr. Keiji
Yoshimura, Dr.
Aki Takeda, and PhD student Mike Freed.
I also assisted in design calibrations and observations planning for the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly
of NASA's Solar Dynamics
Observatory. SDO is NASA's flagship for the Living With a
Star program. With eight channels operating over a
range of wavelengths, AIA is the most complex ultraviolet
telescope ever built. Following launch in February 2010, MSU faculty
and students are participating in analysis
of the scientific data from SDO.
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