Using Polar-orbiting Environmental Satellite data to specify the radiation environment up to 1200 km altitude

Data from the Deal dosimeter payload on the Rapid Pathfinder satellite provide daily maps of the radiation environment on a sphere at 1200km altitude. Through the use of magnetic coordinates, these dosimeter maps can be projected down to lower altitudes, providing valuable information for satellite...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inSpace Weather Vol. 13; no. 8; p. 434
Main Authors O'Brien, T P, Mazur, J E, Guild, T B, Looper, M D
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Washington John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.08.2015
Subjects
Altitude
Dosimeters
Earth orbits
Geophysics
Low earth orbits
Meteorological satellites
POES satellites
Radiation
Real time
Satellite data
Satellites
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Summary:Data from the Deal dosimeter payload on the Rapid Pathfinder satellite provide daily maps of the radiation environment on a sphere at 1200km altitude. Through the use of magnetic coordinates, these dosimeter maps can be projected down to lower altitudes, providing valuable information for satellite anomaly resolution for vehicles in low Earth orbit (LEO). Unfortunately, the Deal data are not widely available, and the mission has a limited lifetime. As an alternative, we present a method to estimate the Deal daily maps using belt index data from NOAA's Polar-orbiting Environmental Satellite (POES) vehicles. The method addresses only trapped radiation but could readily be supplemented with POES's own measurements of solar particle radiation reaching LEO. Key Points Deal dosimeters provide dose rate at 1200km, but not in real time POES data from 800km can be used to estimate Deal data empirically in real time Magnetic coordinates map estimated dose rates from 1200km to lower altitudes
ISSN:1539-4964
1542-7390
DOI:10.1002/2015SW001166