Summer 2020 REU Projects

Icon
Project type and supervisor
  Project title and brief description
(Click title for details)

shock
Modeling with 
Dana Longcope 
  Simulating A Solar Flare
Solar flares occur when a large amount of energy is converted into X-rays, heat, and supersonic fluid motion. Prior to the flare this energy is stored as magnetic field filling the atmosphere above sunspots and related features called active regions. The energy is released suddenly when an electric field changes the connectivity of several coronal magnetic field lines, which then retract rapidly. The fluid in these field line moves faster than the speed of sound and therefore creates shocks, which are believed to heat the plasma to tens of millions of Kelvins. In this project we will run numerical simulations to model this process.
reconnection
Data analysis with 
Marika McCarthy
  Study of Reconnection Events and Their Properties Using Coronal Loops
When viewed in X-ray or extreme ultraviolet (EUV) the Sun's outer atmosphere, the corona, consists of many thin strands called loops. These loops are believed to trace out the magnetic fields, and are formed by a process called magnetic reconnection. Magnetic reconnection exchanges magnetic flux between neighbouring systems and releases magnetic energy. To understand this crucial physical process, we will analyze X-ray and EUV images and make quantitative measurements of magnetic flux involved in reconnection, using a technique pioneered by the team at MSU.
reconnection
Data analysis with 
Jake Parker
  Analyzing Small Solar Eruptions Captured by the ESIS Sounding Rocket and Coordinating Observatories
Our team at Montana State University successfully launched the Extreme Ultraviolet Snapshot Imaging Spectrograph (ESIS) sounding rocket on September 30th 2019. ESIS has a unique capability that takes images of the Sun in multiple spectral orders. In this project, we will analyze one-of-a-kind observations from this new exciting telescope. We will invert the ESIS data using advanced imaging processing techniques to measure Doppler shifts and study properties of small-scale eruptive events on the Sun.
reconnection
Data analysis with 
Jiong Qiu
  Acceleration of Coronal Mass Ejections in the Low Solar Corona
Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) are spectacular energy release events from the Sun's corona. The most interesting and critical physics that is relevant to the trigger and release of CMEs occurs in the low corona. In this project, we will probe these physical processes with observations of the low corona by multiple spacecraft viewing the Sun from different angles.
xrt
Data Analysis with  
Aki Takeda
and Suman Panda
  Solar X-ray Irradiance with Hinode/XRT
Our Sun is a variable star, and the amount of its radiation rises and falls every 11 years or so. The radiation from the Sun received at the earth (irradiance) varies over the activity cycle, and also varies with the observing wavelength. In this project, we will derive the long-term variation of the Sun's irradiance in soft X-rays, using a series of full-Sun images observed with the X-Ray Telescope (XRT) aboard the Hinode satellite, which is an international space mission among Japan/US/UK.
Optical instrumentation with
Joe Shaw
  Analysis of Optical Aurora Detector Data
Auroras, the beautiful light shows in the sky, are caused by solar storms. In this project, we will calibrate an optical instrument that is designed to measure auroras ("northern lights") and send information that can be used to notify interested observers. We will apply the calibration to data collected in Alaska, and explore different aurora-identification algorithms.
SSEL Activities
Hardware development with 
John Sample
  Space Hardware Development: Space Flight Systems for Space Science
Join our Small Satellite Team for Summer 2020! MSU's Space Science and Engineering Laboratory (SSEL) involves science and engineering students in highly responsible roles 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.