Auroral Spatial Structures Probe sounding rocket mission

The Auroral Spatial Structures Probe (ASSP) is a NASA sounding rocket mission that, will be used to study both the spatial and temporal small scale variation of the E-fields during breakup aurora and geomagnetically active conditions. This will be accomplished through the use of a constellation of small payloads that separate relative to each other throughout a sounding rocket flight. The multiple baseline observations of the electric and magnetic fields will be used to observe variability of both the E-field and the Poynting flux. These observations will be placed in the context of available data, including winds, large scale E-fields, and proxy conductivity (airglow images) observations. In this way we will address the main scientific objective of this mission which is: What are the contributions of small spatial scale and rapid temporal scale fluctuations of electric fields relative to the larger-scale electrodynamic processes? The high altitude rocket will be launched along the magnetic field line and carry six sub-payloads to be ejected from the main payload at high velocity. The sub-payloads will be deployed both along the flight path and perpendicular to the flight path so that both spatial features and temporal-spatial ambiguities can be explored. The low-mass sub-payloads that, for a fixed ejection impulse will achieve at least a 50 km separation by the end of the flight are key to the observational success. Each sub-payload will carry a crossed pair of double-probe sensors to measure in-situ electric fields, a three axis magnetometer, a Langmuir probe and a GPS receiver. In this poster we review the ASSP science and mission concepts.