<p>Modelling Solar Energetic Particle Propagation in Realistic Heliospheric Solar Wind Conditions Using a Combined MHD and Stochastic Differential Equation Approach
Abstract
Solar energetic particles (SEPs) are high energy particles originating from solar eruptive events. These particles can be energised at solar flare sites during magnetic reconnection events, or in shock waves propagating in front of coronal mass ejections (CMEs). These CME-driven shocks are in particular believed to act as powerful accelerators of charged particles throughout their propagation in the solar corona. After escaping from their acceleration site, SEPs propagate through the heliosphere and may eventually reach our planet where they can disrupt the microelectronics on satellites in orbit and endanger astronauts among other effects. Therefore it is of vital importance to understand and thereby build models capable of predicting the characteristics of SEP events. The propagation of SEPs in the heliosphere can be described by the time-dependent focused transport equation. This five-dimensional parabolic partial differential equation can be solved using e.g., a finite difference method or by integrating a set of corresponding first order stochastic differential equations. In this work we take the latter approach to model SEP events under different solar wind and scattering conditions. The background solar wind in which the energetic particles propagate is computed using a magnetohydrodynamic model. This allows us to study the influence of different realistic heliospheric configurations on SEP transport. In particular, in this study we focus on exploring the influence of high speed solar wind streams originating from coronal holes that are located close to the eruption source region on the resulting particle characteristics at Earth. Finally, we discuss our upcoming efforts towards integrating our particle propagation model with time-dependent heliospheric MHD space weather modelling.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2017
- Bibcode:
- 2017AGUFMSH31B2737W
- Keywords:
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- 7513 Coronal mass ejections;
- SOLAR PHYSICS;
- ASTROPHYSICS;
- AND ASTRONOMY;
- 7514 Energetic particles;
- SOLAR PHYSICS;
- ASTROPHYSICS;
- AND ASTRONOMY;
- 7519 Flares;
- SOLAR PHYSICS;
- ASTROPHYSICS;
- AND ASTRONOMY;
- 7524 Magnetic fields;
- SOLAR PHYSICS;
- ASTROPHYSICS;
- AND ASTRONOMY