Evaluating pointing strategies for future solar flare missions

Solar flares are events of intense scientific interest. Missions whose science objectives depend on observing solar flares must often make difficult decisions on where to target their observations if they do not observe the full solar disk. Therefore, we simulate and analyze the performance of different observation strategies using historical flare and active region data from 2011 to 2014. We test a number of different target selection strategies based on active region complexity and recent flare activity, each of which is examined under a range of operational assumptions. The mission responsiveness to new information is investigated as a key factor determining flare observation performance, while the instrument field-of-view is also explored. We study various metrics such as the number of flares observed, the size of flares observed, and operational considerations such as the number of mission re-points that are required, and the distribution of pointing locations on the Sun. Overall, a future low-earth orbit flare mission is anticipated to observe between 35 - 47% of large flares that occur, while a mission with an uninterrupted view of the Sun could observe between 48 - 62% of large flares. Target selection methods based on recent flare activity showed the best overall performance, but required more repointings than other methods. It is also shown that target selection methods based on active region complexities show a significant pointing bias towards the western solar hemisphere. These results provide valuable performance estimates for a future mission focused on solar flares, and inform the requirements that would ensure mission success.