OPERATIONS
Science Operations
FINAL MINUTES FOR SOHO 25 May 2007 SPWG MEETING
1. Boundary conditions
a) Orbit, attitude and manoeuvres
- SOHO is in normal roll (0 deg) position
- manoeuvres
May 29 roll, stationkeeping and momentum management
Aug 30 or 31 stationkeeping and momentum management
Aug 31 roll
Nov 20 roll, stationkeeping and momentum management
(timing TBC)
b) Communications with the spacecraft
Graphical DSN schedule: http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/soc/dsn/
* May 18-Jun 5 26 m keyhole
* May 22-May 31 34 m keyhole
* Aug 11-Sep 9 26 m keyhole
* Aug 19-Sep 2 34 m keyhole
* Nov 15-Dec 2 26 m keyhole
* Nov 19-Nov 28 34 m keyhole
- The need and approach to reduce FOT manpower requirements needed for
complex operations during the keyhole remains in effect until further
notice.
All available keyhole information is at
http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/soc/keyholes.html
c) KNOWN submode dependent activities/submode changes:
* TOO JOP153/MMOP003 Future Major Flare Watch (SM5 if SUMER
observes target, SM6 otherwise)
* Oct 22-Nov 2 Active region morphology studies (TBC), SUMER/VTT/
HINODE (TBC)/TRACE/STEREO
* Jul 26, Aug 2 EIT shutterless #28 (timing TBC)
* Nov 1,8 EIT shutterless #29 (timing TBC)
- Some of the default SUMER campaign dates overlap with keyholes -
which is not a problem in itself (submode 5 will often be needed for
keyholes anyhow) as long as potential periods of no SUMER data
between passes can be accepted.
- Except for Major Flare Watches, TRACE will be doing full disk
mosaics if/when EIT is not able to do synoptic sets due to keyhole
operations.
d) Instrument maintenance activities
EIT bakeout periods will be during keyholes. Dates and times are
defined when the DSN schedules become available.
EIT in bakeout for May keyhole 18-24 May.
e) Others
TRACE will have a summer eclipse season from about 24 May - 16 Jul (dates
are TBC).
Hinode eclipse season 7 May - 10 Aug.
2. Priorities for the coming month and more
a) Joint observing plans and campaigns
Continuing campaigns:
* 2002/02/25-- JOP136 Default RHESSI Collaborations (#6850),
POC: Tero Siili
* 2003/05/13-- Default CDS Co-observations with TRACE (#6950)
* 2005/09/20-- JOP153/MMOP003 Future Major Flare Watch (#8007)
* 2007/03/20-- Default CDS/Hinode-EIS co-observations (#7200)
Campaign #6850 is for "individual instrument studies" selecting an active
region target [partially] influenced by the Max Millennium target
selection to maximise chances of serendipitous co-observations.
EIT supports all with half/full-res 195 A CME watch in submode 5/6. As
long as the spacecraft is in submode 6, all EIT CME watch will be in full
res. Major Flare Watches will be in full-res even if it requires a
submode change, unless the target is observed by SUMER.
The relevance and continuation (whether the originators have
enough/alternate data) of these campaigns (except perhaps for RHESSI) is
under review.
* Jul 3-8 JOP 178 Filament and its Environment (TBC)/
JOP157 Bright points in active regions (TBC),
SOHO/THEMIS, POC: Brigitte Schmieder
Proposal for consideration from the POC. JOP 157 would be used, if a target
of opportunity appears. SOHO supports are solicited.
CDS will support.
MDI can support with either HR or FD Magnetograms.
* Jun 14-18 MDI Continuous Contact, TBC
Current default plan is high-resolution magnetograms in FOC4. Timing
TBC.
* Jul 18-22 MDI Continuous Contact, TBC
Default campaign is full disk, 1 minute cadence magnetograms and
dopplergrams.
* Jul 1-Aug 5 JOP 188 Prominence Mass Composition and Variability Study,
CDS/EIT/MDI/TRACE/STEREO-EUVI/Hinode-SOT/Hinode-EIS/MLSO,
POC: Gary Kilper
A study on the relative abundances of hydrogen and helium in prominences
and on their trends in spatial distribution and variability over time is
proposed. The method is measurement of the continuum absorption due to
photoionization for EUV observations and of the absorption in H-alpha
(6563 A) and He I (10830 A).
Timing is TBC.
Supports from the listed instruments are solicited.
CDS will consider supporting on selected dates as time allows, but need
to receive the proposal and details of CDS observations and studies.
EIT will support. This item needs approval as a JOP. Who will lead first
run at EOF?
TRACE will support, but JOP 178 will get priority during its conflicting
period.
MDI will support with synoptic Continuum Images when in high rate.
* Aug 3-31 JOP 189 Physical mechanisms driving solar microflares and
supergranular network dynamics - relevance for coronal
heating, CDS/EIT/MDI/Hinode-EIS/Hinode-SOT/Hinode-XRT/
RHESSI/TRACE/DOT/KSO, POC: Jan Rybak, Peter Gomory
Detailed campaign/coordination information can be found at
http://www.astro.sk/~choc/open/07_dot/07_dot.html.
The Hinode/EIS,SOT,XRT application will be sent to SSCs on the week
starting 28 May 2007.
Having in mind the SOHO keyhole we plan to request for the Hinode support
mainly after Aug 17 expecting the SOHO will be supporting (at least)
partially until Aug 17 in the time interval 07:00-13:30 UT (for UT times,
see also the Aug 5-18 campaign).
Supports from the listed instruments are solicited.
CDS will support on selected dates, as time allows.
EIT will support through ~ August 9, but keyhole begins August 10. This
item needs approval as a JOP. Who will lead first run at EOF?
TRACE will only support 20-31 Aug.
HR Filtergrams and Magnetograms when target in the HRFOV. FD Magnetograms
and Dopplergrams otherwise.
* Aug 5-18 Filament/Cavity-CME-ICME IHY-CIP campaign,
CDS/UVCS/TRACE/Hinode-EIS/Hinode-XRT/Hinode-SOT/COMP/
SOLARC/ProMag/MWA/RHESSI, POC: Terry Kucera
As part of the International Heliophysical Year (IHY), we propose an
observing campaign in the time interval August 5-18, 2007 which will
follow a targetted filament from East to West limb, in order to study its
morphology, evolution and activation, and quantify its magnetic and
plasma properties. Our study will be greatly enhanced should the filament
erupt as a CME, and if it does, we will also examine in situ observations
in order to link any pertinent ICME and magnetic cloud observations to
their filament source.
The campaign is a conglomeration of four International Heliophysical Year
(IHY) Coordinated Investigaton Programmes (CIPs) which are headed up by
Barbara Thompson, Sarah Gibson, Holly Gilbert and Pat McIntosh.
The most important time of day for campaign participation would be 17:00
-- 20:00 UT, the best observing period of Mauna Loa. The full Mauna Loa
observing day can run from 16:30 -- 02:30 UT. Scheduling spacecraft
supports to these times would help to interleave with the JOP 189, which
has its ground-based support focus on Canary islands and in Europe.
CDS has not heard from the POC yet and is awaiting for contact, but is
likely to participate in some form.
MDI inquired, whether its support is solicited.
JOP? EIT can support through CME watch. Keyhole begins August 10.
* Sep 10-Nov 11 MDI 60-day Continuous Contact (TBC)
DSN schedule is not yet known (see section 1b). MDI will run 1 min
cadence, full disk magnetograms and dopplergrams.
* Oct 22-Nov 2 Active region morphology studies (TBC), SUMER/VTT/
HINODE (TBC)/TRACE/STEREO
See section 2c for further details.
CDS will join the campaign - please add CDS Planner e-mail address to the
mailing list.
TRACE has slightly different dates: 21 Oct - 1 Nov. The discrepancy is
being investigated.
b) Intercalibration activities
Last Intercal 1: 16 May 2007
* June 11-15 ICAL01 (#7113), CDS/EIT, TBC
Details and confirmation will be determined by the planners.
EIT: ICALs are OK except (usually) during the weeks of shutterless.
c) Individual instrument plans
MDI:
See section 2a for MDI continuous contact periods.
MDI may reduce the ALT cadence during Keyholes to be less than 15 ALT
magnetograms per day if the lack of high rate telemetry is such that we
will lose all or almost all of the 15 ALT Magnetograms each day. The ALT
cadence will be decided on an individual Keyhole basis and even a daily
basis during each Keyhole depending on the 70 m antenna availability at
the time. MDI may also downlink select magnetograms in the 5 kbps
telemetry if no 70 m passes are available at least every 2 days for Mag
dump in the 160 kbps telemetry.
All requests for MDI support need to be made several months ahead of time
and sent to mdi-ops(at)mdisas.nascom.nasa.gov. Even outside keyholes,
MDI can only do 1-minute cadence observations when we have contact and
there is no recorder dump in progress.
MDI's REQUEST page is at http://mdisas.nascom.nasa.gov/coordination.txt
NOTE: Listing of a study on that page means *only* that a request has
been received, not that it will necessarily be supported.
A description of MDI Observing Modes most used for JOPs and campaigns (FD
vs. HR) can be found at http://mdisas.nascom.nasa.gov/Collaborate.
Anyone requesting MDI observations is encouraged to read this page in
order to have a better idea of what observing modes would be best suited
for a particular study. More detailed information about how MDI
operates, observational constraints and telemetry information can be
found at http://mdisas.nascom.nasa.gov/MDI_Collaboration_Details.
MDI is in focus 5, best focus for full-disk observing. MDI will be in
best focus for high-resolution observing (FOC4) at the end of the
May/June 2007 Keyhole until the end of June.
The MDI data archive relocation at Stanford University (scheduled for the
week of 28 April through 6 May, 2007) was completed successfully,
archiving and data export are working normally.
UVCS:
We have been using the LyA detector for some observations and will keep
planning so when appropriate.
For weekly plans, see the SOHO calendar and the UVCS planning page:
http://www.cfa.harvard.edu/uvcs/observations/obst.html.
CDS:
For details see http://solar.bnsc.rl.ac.uk/scientificops/request.shtml.
Given the extended duration of the Ulysses-SOHO quadrature, CDS will
carry out several observations at a convenient date selected at a
relatively short notice.
LASCO/EIT:
EIT: 195 A CME watch plus synoptics at 6-hour cadence, as usual. Full-res
CME watch whenever we're in submode 6.
SUMER:
There are tentative plans for a campaign from Oct 22 to Nov 2, working
title "Active region morphology studies, joint observations of SUMER,
VTT, HINODE, TRACE, STEREO", and also accomodating studies, which could
not be run during the spring campaign. Observers, who are interested in
support from participating instruments are highly requested to
prepare/update a detailed JOP/HOP description and to contact the
instrument representatives. Hinode participation is still TBC.
TRACE:
NOTE that TRACE in general reserves the right to withdraw support from
agreed, existing collaborations if a sufficiently "good active region" is
called by the Max Millennium group.
For TRACE summer eclipse season see section 1e.
3. Any other business
* Next SPWG: Friday 29 June after daily & weekly meetings The rest are FYI items: * If anyone has projects that require high rate (i.e. 1 minute cadence) MDI support, now is a good time to ask! If you need MDI data, make sure you request it specifically. There is no significant change in the shutter performance over the last 10 months; monitoring continues, but no immediate changes in operations are planned. * DSN support should be requested at least 6 months in advance. Keep this in mind for: ground-based collaborations that require MDI support, stellar/shutterless observations that require NRT, etc. * Future Mercury and Venus transits: SOC is requesting the Flight Dynamics Facility (FDF) to provide estimates and data for not only disk, but also for coronal transits. For this purpose FDF needs a criterion (radial/angular distance from Solar disk centre) to define the coronal transits. Currently FDF has been instructed to use SOHO/Sun/[Mercury,Venus] angle of (35 arcmin (from centre of Solar disk) as criterion. Instrument teams are requested to provide the SOC with information on whether a larger angle is applicable. * Hinode operational and planning information can be found from http://www.isas.jaxa.jp/home/solar/hinode_op/ * STEREO operational and planning information can be found via http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/, more specifically from http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/plans.shtml. * The SOHO JOP/ICAL database and the web pages are now the Solar JOP/ICAL database and web pages. This is due to anticipated increased contributions by and collaborations as well as intercalibrations with STEREO and Hinode. * To provide more unambiguous identification, individual instruments on board spacecraft other than SOHO will be as of this SPWG be referred to with notation SPACECRAFT-INSTRUMENT, for example Hinode-EIS. * The Project Scientist has decided that submission of the Inputs to the Activity Plan (IAPs) will change to be voluntary. The PS has informed the SOHO community of the change on 22 Feb by e-mail. * The FOT will begin testing the automation procedures on the week beginning 19 March. The passes will continue to be manned until after an operational readiness review and both agencies agree to a change in the mission management plan, both of which won't be for at least a couple of months, after we have significant experience with the automation. * New JOP vs. modified existing JOP rules-of-thumb: New JOP, if/when scientifically or qualitatively new type of a coordination is set up; modified JOP, when the investigation (the foci or targets thereof) remains essentially the same but new instruments/spacecraft/GBOs/etc are brought to bear.
