A Data-driven, Physics-based Transport Model of Solar Energetic Particles Accelerated by Coronal Mass Ejection Shocks Propagating through the Solar Coronal and Heliospheric Magnetic Fields

Abstract

In an effort to develop computational tools for predicting radiation hazards from solar energetic particles (SEPs), we have created a data-driven physics-based particle transport model to calculate the injection, acceleration, and propagation of SEPs from coronal mass ejection (CME) shocks traversing through the solar corona and interplanetary magnetic fields. The model runs on an input of corona and heliospheric plasma and magnetic field configuration from a magnetohydrodynamic model driven by solar photospheric magnetic field measurements superposed with observed CME shocks determined from coronagraph images. SEP source particles are injected at the shock using the result of diffusive shock acceleration formulation from a characteristic obliquity-dependent injection from a heated solar wind thermal tail population. With several advanced computation techniques involving stochastic simulation and integration, the model obtains the particle intensity at any location in interplanetary space through the rigorous solution to the time-dependent 5D focus transport equation in the phase space that includes perpendicular diffusion. We apply the model to the 2011 November 3 CME event. The calculation results reproduce multispacecraft SEP observations at Earth and STEREO-B reasonably well without normalization of particle flux. The observations at STEREO-A can be reproduced by rescaling particle energy or modified energy dependence of particle diffusion coefficients. This circumsolar SEP event seen by spacecraft at Earth, STEREO-A, and STEREO-B at widely separated longitudes can be explained by diffusive shock acceleration by a single CME shock with a moderate speed.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Jun 01, 2023
Source ID
10.3847/1538-4365/accb8e

Entities

People

  • David Lario
  • Ju Zhang
  • Laura A Balmaceda
  • Lei Cheng
  • Ming Zhang
  • N. V. Pogorelov
  • Pete Riley
  • R-Y Kwon

Organizations

  • Goddard Space Flight Center
  • Heliophysics Science Division
  • National Research Foundation of Korea
  • Office of Naval Research
  • United States Department of Energy

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Aerosol Science/Aerosol Physics
  • Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)
  • Solar Physics

Technology Areas

  • Space