Space Weather

From COSMIAC

From left to right: John Saugen, Margaret Colberg, Matt McCullough, Anastasia Ierides, Ben Schaefer, Rose Perea, William DeRaad, Grant Heileman, Zach Chacon, Mario Ortega, Ryan Helinski *Not Pictured: Cody Bodman and Rosemary Burns

Introduction

The mission of the project is to help understand the effects of the ionosphere on the propagation of electromagnetic (EM) waves. Fluctuations in the electron content of the ionospheric layers are the principal phenomena that affect EM wave propagation. By studying the propagation of waves through the ionosphere, we hope to understand these phenomena.

Phase 1: To produce a ground-based system to detect radio frequency (RF) emissions from lightning within the frequency band of 30-300MHz.

Phase 2: To create three second-revision ground-based systems that will be installed around the state and will enable the triangulation of lightning.

Phase 3: To integrate the ground detection system into a compact low-power CubeSat form factor.

Background

• Physics

• Stanford’s Space and Systems Development Laboratory Camera
• Spring 2010 Senior Design Project Report

Major System Blocks

COSMIAC Poster1

COSMIAC Poster2

• Lightning Antenna - Anastasia, Cody, Mario, Rose
• ADC Board - Ben, Matt
• FIFO Board - John, William, Rosemary
• Controller Board - Grant, Rosemary, Zach
• GPS - Grant, Rosemary, Zach

Media:Space Weather Design Project Posters.zip

Fourier Stuff

Below contains the Fourier information from Dr. Krezan Fourier Series Sept. 3rd, 2010 -

• Media:Fourier Series.pdf
• Media:FT Final.xls
• Media:FT Tutorial.pdf
• Media:Exp and Trig Defin.doc

Instrumentation

The students used data from United States Precision Lightning Network (USPLN) in conjunction with signals captured from the antenna in order to characterize the RF spectrum of the antenna using lightning in the area. The students learned how to use the Local Data Manager (LDM) from Unidata.

• Local Data Manager (LDM)
• USPLN Plots