What have White Dwarfs, Neutron Stars, and Black Holes in common? – Accretion disks! For a Swiss who has stirred cheese in multiple occasions and settings, a direct comparison to fork-induced cheese swirls seems obvious. As Alexandra Veledina from University of Turku in Finland points out, the spinning matter of the two might look similar but the physics involved are fundamentally different. Veledina was one of the lead conveners of the ISSI Workshop on Accretion Disks bringing together more than thirty international experts to discuss and sharpen our understanding about them that we developed over the past fifty years.
International experts converge to explore the role of Earth Observation in enhancing blue carbon ecosystems for climate change mitigation.
Mysterious happenings are reported from within the International Space Science Institute in Bern, Switzerland.
ISSI is currently witnessing a vibrant exchange of ideas as experts from across the globe are convening for the inaugural day of the “Chronology of the Very Early Universe According to JWST: The First Billion Years” workshop.
The Sun often produces eruptive events on different energetic and temporal scales. It might, however, also produce events, so-called extreme solar events, whose energy could be orders of magnitude greater than anything we have observed during recent decades. But what is an extreme solar event? How strong can they be and how often do they occur?
The Earth’s atmosphere and ocean are in the focus of Professor Weiqing Han, who is affiliated with the University of Colorado and a former ‘Johannes Geiss Fellow’ at ISSI Bern. Her focus is predominantly on the dynamics of our evolving climate across intra-seasonal to decadal time frames. Important facets of her work encompass ocean dynamics, regional sea-level fluctuations, climate variability, and the intricate interplay between the atmosphere and the ocean. Below, Professor Han provides a synopsis of her latest publications arising from her time as an ISSI fellow.
The recent conference, “The Economics and Law of Space-Based Commerce,” convened here in Bern, Switzerland, brought together key stakeholders and researchers from diverse fields, including economics, law, politics, and space sciences. The event tackled pressing questions surrounding the governance framework for private actors in space commerce.
The dynamic connections between space weather and weather in Earth’s lower atmosphere was the target of last week’s ISSI workshop. This gathering, between leading experts in space, Earth observation and atmospheric science, delved into the intricate physical interplay shaping our planet’s weather and climate.
ISSI Forum sparks breakthrough guidance for remote sensing collaborations to monitor climate tipping points
In a novel cross-disciplinary effort, the ISSI Team around Erika Palmerio and David Barnes is revolutionizing our understanding of Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), powerful solar eruptions with significant space weather impacts on Earth. Focusing on the often-overlooked tomography technique, the team utilizes state-of-the-art magnetohydrodynamic simulations and synthetic white-light data to overcome observational limitations. By placing virtual spacecraft strategically, they generate synthetic images, reconstructing CME structures through discrete tomography.
The findings based on their modelling reveal a complex, irregular front in contrast to traditional assumptions. The team aims to evaluate the impact of 3D reconstructions on space weather predictions, comparing them with conventional forward-modelling techniques. With plans to extend analyses to heliospheric imagery, their work promises groundbreaking insights into CME behavior and improved forecasting methods. Stay tuned for further revelations from this innovative endeavor tackled at ISSI Bern!
See the full team report here: “Tomographic Inversion of Synthetic White-Light Images: Advancing Our Understanding of CMEs in 3D“
Global sea level and extreme ocean events are rising due to human-caused climate change. The amount of rise in sea level and number of increase in extreme events, however, vary greatly from region to region and they also change over time. To fully understand these changes and thus build the capability of predicting when and where they may occur in the future, we must also consider naturally occurring climate variability.
The Hubble Space Telescope has been called the most productive scientific instrument in human history. Launched in 1990, the telescope has performed observations which have measured the age of the Universe, confirmed the existence of black holes, discovered the accelerating Universe, and amazed the general public. On Christmas day in 2021 the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was launched into space after decades of development. JWST was designed to extend the view of Hubble in regions of the cosmos Hubble can’t penetrate. JWST is exceeding the grand expectations of its ability to unravel the mysteries of the Universe. Join Astronaut/Astrophysicist John Grunsfeld as he takes us through the stories of Hubble and Webb.
The Earth’s magnetosphere shields our planet from hazardous space weather effects caused by solar disturbances and energetic particles. However, the global structure of the magnetosphere is still extremely difficult to describe. Major challenges include the scarcity of data sets, as well as the breadth of physical processes that need to be taken into account. Our ISSI Team explores various approaches that help to mitigate these challenges. Recent publications from our ISSI Team provide new insights into how to extract information about global magnetospheric and ionospheric structures, and how to combine global data analysis and global modeling in meaningful ways. The new results suggest potentially transformative ways to work with global datasets, develop new global models, and improve the accuracy of the current global models.
Earth’s magnetic environment is filled with a symphony of sound that we cannot hear. All around our planet, ultralow-frequency waves compose a cacophonous operetta portraying the dramatic relationship between Earth and the Sun. Now, a new citizen science project called HARP – or Heliophysics Audified: Resonances in Plasmas – has turned those once-unheard waves into audible whistles, crunches, and whooshes. Early tests have already made surprising finds, and citizen scientists can join the journey of sonic space exploration to decipher the cosmic vibrations that help sing the song of the Sun and Earth.
