Studying the Solar Mysteries

Normalized 3D electron density distribution resulting from tomographic inversion of polarized-brightness coronagraph images using the six-spacecraft “Solar Ring” configuration. Figure adjusted from ISSI Bern workshop results by Palmerio, Barnes, et al.
Normalized 3D electron density distribution resulting from tomographic inversion of polarized-brightness coronagraph images using the six-spacecraft “Solar Ring” configuration. Figure adjusted from ISSI Bern workshop results by Palmerio, Barnes, et al.

A Trailblazing Journey to Decode Coronal Mass Ejections in 3D

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

ISSI/ISSI-BJ 2024 Joint Call for Proposals for International Teams in the Space & Earth Sciences

This call is jointly released by ISSI (International Space Science Institute) in Bern and ISSI– Beijing (ISSI-BJ). ISSI & ISSI-BJ organise the same range of activities and share the same Science Committee. Applicants can apply for projects hosted by ISSI or ISSI-BJ only, or for joint ISSI/ISSI-BJ projects involving meetings at both sites. All International Team projects are assessed on the same criteria, irrespective of the host venue. In preparation for the anonymous peer-review of the science justification section of Team proposals, ISSI expects applicants to fully anonymise their proposals according to our guidelines.

ISSI and ISSI-BJ invite proposals for International Team projects. International Teams are small groups of scientists conducting space science research by collaborating on data analysis, theory and models. This call is open to all scientists – regardless of nationality or institutional affiliation – who are active in any of the following research fields:

  1. Space Sciences: Astrobiology, Astrophysics and Cosmology, Fundamental Physics in Space, Magnetospheric and Space Plasma Physics, Planetary Sciences, Solar and Heliospheric Physics, and Solar-Terrestrial Sciences.
  2. Earth Sciences using space data. This includes understanding and modelling Earth system processes, as well as climate change projections.

Complete Call for Proposals for International Teams in Space and Earth Sciences >>

Proposal Submission Deadline: March 14, 2024 

A 3-minute Guide to Preparing an ISSI International Team Proposal >>
 

Proposal submission is closed.

The Economics and Law of Space-Based Commerce (Conference hosted by WTI and ISSI | 17–18 January 2024)

This conference (17–18 January 2024) will focus on the economics and governance of commercialisation in outer space. It will look at the applicability of economic concepts, the concepts of international economic law, and the concepts of economic governance to space-based commerce.

The goal is twofold: The first goal is identifying promising areas for future research along the lines outlined above, specifically a cross-disciplinary mix of economics, law, political science, and applied natural science. The second goal is to enlist interested researchers in setting up a research and workshop agenda and loose organizational/coordinating structure (a researcher network) based on the areas identified.

The conference will be hosted jointly by the International Space Science Institute and the World Trade Institute.

Find here the complete program >>

You can join online the conference, therefore please register here.

Solar and Stellar Dynamos: A New Era

New Topical Collection published in Space Science Reviews (Open Access)

Large-scale and small-scale dynamos generating magnetic flux are fundamental processes in astrophysics, for which solar and stellar dynamos provide crucial paradigms. During the last two decades, a wealth of new observational results, together with a new generation of large-scale numerical simulations, gave important insights in the complex interactions of turbulent convection, rotation, and magnetic fields by self-excited dynamo action in the Sun and other stars. 

This open-access collection edited by Manfred Schüssler, Robert Cameron, Paul Charbonneau, Mausumi Dikpati, Hideyuki Hotta and Leonid Kitchatinov, presents results from the ISSI Workshop “Solar and Stellar Dynamos: a New Era”, held 13–17 June 2022, which reviewed and put into perspective the results from observations, simulations, and simplified models. It covers the whole range of topics discussed during the meeting: solar and stellar observations from space and ground, numerical simulations, turbulence theory, and dynamo models.

This collection will be also published as #90 in the Space Science Series of ISSI.

From the Desk of the ISSI Executive Director

Dear Colleagues,

with 2023 winding down, it is time to reflect on the accomplishments and challenges of this year.

We are saddened to watch a world that is now riddled with conflicts.At ISSI, we take solace in the realization that science remains the great unifier, the common language that you all speak, when you visit our institution. Science does not know national barriers or frontiers, because all scientists share the same desire to pursue knowledge, to understand the Universe, whether it is by studying our beautiful planet, or the mysteries of our Sun, or observing the furthest galaxies.

ISSI’s mission is stronger than ever, and we are eager to continue playing our small role in making this world a better and more peaceful place. The number of scientists we welcomed at ISSI this year has exceeded pre-pandemic levels, and the request to visit is growing. There is a sense of joy in gathering in a neutral and welcoming environment just to focus on compelling scientific questions, unincumbered by daily duties, in beautiful Bern. We hear this from our visitors all the time, how much they enjoy spending time at ISSI, discussing and debating, moving science forward. After less than one year in this job as Executive Director, I still marvel at the feeling of fulfillment that comes from hearing the happy chatter in the hallways, from seeing the smiles of diverse groups of people working together, with intent.

As we look at the future, I am delighted to share some news that I believe will help us serving you, our community, even better. First, we have acquired a small amount of additional space on the fourth floor that will allow for an expanded office and conference footprint. There will be more space for informal discussions and gatherings. Also in 2024, we will be starting new activities in the areas of Exoplanets/Astrobiology, and we will augment our presence in Earth observations with focus on climate change, a topic that is of great interest to us all both as scientists and as citizens of this planet. We are also going to place a bigger emphasis on communicating the amazing science you all do when you visit. A completely redesigned website will do that by giving prominence to science news and easier access to all the valuable initiatives that ISSI offers. Finally, we will explore how to make our activities sustainable. Stay tuned to learn more about all of this in the next few months.

In conclusion, I would like to offer much appreciation to the wonderful ISSI staff, who are dedicated and committed to making your visits pleasant and successful.

And to you all, my best wishes for wonderful festive holidays and a healthy, happy and peaceful New Year.

Antonella Nota

Executive Director

The Heliosphere in the Local Interstellar Medium – Into the Unknown

Volume 88 in the Space Sciences Series of ISSI

“The Heliosphere in the Local Interstellar Medium”, the Proceedings of the first ISSI Workshop (6-10 November 1995), held in Bern, Switzerland and edited by R. von Steiger, R. Lallement, and M.A. Lee and published in 1996, was the first International Space Science Institute (ISSI) book (#1) in the Space Sciences Series. This book covers the knowledge gained in the subsequent 27 years that revolutionized our understanding of the interaction of the heliosphere with the very local interstellar medium (VLISM). Entirely new regions of space have been explored! The Voyagers both crossed the termination shock, passed through the heliosheath, crossed the heliopause, and entered the interstellar medium. New Horizons was launched with more modern instrumentation and explores low-latitude regions of the outer heliosphere. Energetic neutral atoms observed by IBEX and CASSINI allowed exploration of the heliosphere over the whole sky. The initial reconnaissance of the heliosphere and VLISM is complete with in situ measurements, observations of energetic neutral atoms (ENAs), neutral VLISM H and He, UV emissions, and interstellar dust.

This book is a collection reviews from experts in the many aspects of this field that describe the current state of knowledge of the heliosphere’s interaction with the interstellar medium, puzzles yet to be solved, and future plans to continue these studies.

This volume results from a Workshop held at the International Space Science Institute (ISSI) in Bern on 8–12 November, 2021.

The book is edited by J.R. Richardson, A. Bykov, F. Effenberger, K. Scherer, V.J. Sterken, R. von Steiger and G.P. Zank.

This Volume is co-published as open access Topical Collection in Space Science Reviews.

“Genetically Modified Galaxies” with Andrew Pontzen (UCL, UK)

Computer simulations of the universe have been in common use since the 1980s, and are now a vital tool in helping us interpret data from increasingly powerful telescopes. Amongst other things, simulations have helped establish the case for dark matter and dark energy, and have been key to creating a broad consensus around the idea that galaxies start small and grow over time through merging. The speaker reviews in outline how these simulations work, and highlight that a key difficulty in understanding their results is to untangle cause and effect. For example, the observed diversity of different galaxy sizes, shapes and colours can be reproduced in a statistical sense, but there is still considerable uncertainty around which causal processes give rise to this diversity. The speaker explains how exerting careful experimentation with the initial conditions for our simulations, which represent conditions shortly after the ‘big bang’, we can start to address these uncertainties. We call this technique ‘genetic modification’, since it loosely corresponds to controlling the genes of our virtual galaxies, to see how the galaxies mature and develop in response. This in turn helps to build a more complete physical picture of how galaxies mature over time, with carefully quantified uncertainties. The speaker discusses how such efforts are vital to making sense of new observations from cutting-edge and future facilities like Gaia, JWST, ELT, SKA and LISA.

Andrew Pontzen is a professor of cosmology at University College London (UCL), and is currently principal investigator of the ERC consolidator project GMGalaxies. His research concerns how structures formed in our universe, using a combination of theoretical and computational advances including the ‘genetic modification’ technique which he pioneered and which will be the focus of this talk. He was the founding co-director of the UCL Cosmoparticle Initiative which fosters interdisciplinary research, and has received multiple awards for his research and communication.  He is the author of The Universe in a Box which is a non-specialist book focussing on the role of simulations in cosmology and beyond, recently published to critical acclaim.

 
Webinar was recorded on November 30, 2023

Interview with Johannes Geiss Fellow Sandra Chapman

Sandra Chapman is the Johannes Geiss Fellow 2023 and is a plasma physicist working on problems in astrophysics and in the laboratory. She is currently Professor of Physics and Director of the Centre for Fusion, Space and Astrophysics at the University of Warwick and adjunct Professor at UIT. Her early work on nonlinear plasmas was recognised with the COSPAR Zeldovich Medal (commission D) and the EGS Young Scientists’ Medal. She was selected to give the 2014 Royal Astronomical Society James Dungey Lecture and the 2020 Ed Lorenz Lecture at the Fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Sandra is part of a team awarded a 2021 Lloyd’s of London Science of Risk Prize. She has been awarded the 2022 Royal Astronomical Society Chapman Medal and the 2024 Johannes Alfvén Medal of the European Geosciences Union. In the following paragraphs she answers a few questions – asked by Roland Hohensinn, ISSI Post Doc – about her research. Roland Hohensinn is postdoctoral fellow in Earth Sciences and Data scientist. He does research on uncertainty quantification from satellite remote sensing data, with a focus on space geodetic techniques (GRACE/GRACE-FO terrestrial water storage, long-term GPS ground motions).

Roland Hohensinn: Sandra, please explain us the beauty of your science.

Sandra Chapman: I have been privileged to be able to work across a variety of topics under the general heading of ‘plasma physics’. Plasmas are not only ubiquitous in the universe, they are also fundamentally non-linear and, in space and astrophysical systems particularly, are far from equilibrium. So our study of plasma physics touches upon some of the deepest physics questions- how does entropy increase in a collisionless plasma? How do we go from physics which on the microscale is reversible, but on the macroscale, irreversible, without collisional dissipation? How are particles accelerated, how do energy and momentum flow between fields and particles?

The models and mind-pictures that we use are based on the equations of Maxwell, Lorentz, Liouville et al, and these are fundamentally beautiful in their structure and expression. I am a great fan of ‘the truth is usually beautiful’ approach to physics.

Sandra Chapman, Johannes Geiss Fellow 2023, and Roland Hohensinn, ISSI Post Doc

Roland Hohensinn: Which transformations you see your field undergoing at the moment?

Sandra Chapman: Thinking about space plasma physics, I think this is a particularly exciting, and challenging time. When I was beginning my physics career, the norm was to have access to the data from a single satellite and to look in detail at single time-series, perhaps to try some conjugate study with ground based observations or a second satellite. Plasma simulations were highly restricted in dimension and could only capture one physical scale of interest. Now we are in a data-rich era with imaging, multiple satellites and hundreds of ground based observations, all at unprecedented spatial and temporal resolution, but these observations are not homogeneous. Alongside this, we now have the capability to build and run computer simulations which evolve the fully non-linear plasma physics across multiple physical space and timescales. We need to think of new ways to extract, visualize, interrogate and compare the relevant information from this data, both from observations and simulations. There are many new tools for this that are well-established in other fields:  networks, machine learning, AI, but the critical first step in this process is in formulating the physics questions to be asked of the data and building this into the analysis pathway, otherwise it is ‘garbage in, garbage out’. I don’t think that human physicists will be out of a job anytime soon!

Roland Hohensinn: How do you see the current and future role of ISSI in space sciences?

Sandra Chapman: It is one of life’s ironies that the more a science career progresses, the less time there is available to actually do science. So institutes like ISSI are an invaluable refuge that combine time to think, with opportunities to discuss. Physics has no borders and space science in particular is intrinsically international. ISSI in particular offers the flexibility to co-ordinate international teams on new topics. The ways in which we communicate our science, to each other, and to the wider public, are also changing rapidly and ISSI I think is well positioned to play a key role in this.

The Johannes Geiss Fellowship (JGF) is established to attract to ISSI – for limited duration visits – international scientists of stature, who can make demonstrable contributions to the ISSI mission and increase ISSI’s stature by their presence and by doing so will honor Johannes Geiss for his founding of ISSI and his contributions to ISSI, and for his many contributions to a broad range of space science disciplines.

Job Posting: Postdoctoral Position Opening in the Multi-messenger Astronomy related to CTA

The International Space Science Institute (ISSI) in Bern, Switzerland, invites applications for a

Postdoctoral Position Opening
in the Multi-messenger Astronomy related to CTA

for one year, renewable, ideally starting in January 2024, or to be negotiated. The Postdoctoral Fellow position is within the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) project and in close collaboration with the University of Geneva. The CTA is the next-generation ground-based gamma-ray observatory featuring tens of telescopes located at two sites in both hemispheres. It will allow probing the high energy cosmic ray sources with unprecedented sensitivity and angular resolution, in the energy domain from tens of GeV to hundreds of TeV.

The University of Bern and Geneva group lead the Calibration Pipeline subsystem of the CTA Data Processing and Preservation System (DPPS) and contribute to the development of the Data Quality Pipeline. The DPPS is a software system responsible for the reconstruction, processing, quality monitoring, and preservation of data products of the CTA.

The successful candidate should have received a Ph.D. within the last five years and is expected to work on the development and implementation of the data quality monitoring tools, and related software infrastructure.

Required Qualifications

  • Experience with the Data Quality Monitoring in the domain of (astro)particle physics
  • Strong knowledge of Python
  • Familiarity with version control systems (Git/GitLab)
  • 0Ph.D. in Physics/Astronomy/Computer Science or related discipline

Preferred Qualifications

  • Experience with UI design
  • Experience in data analysis in the field of very high-energy gamma-ray astrophysics
  • Experience in web application development

Salary and conditions of employment will be similar to those provided by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF salary ranges). Nationals from ESA Member States are especially encouraged to apply.

Further information may received by contacting Prof. Maurizio Falanga (mfalanga@issibern.ch) or Prof. Teresa Montaruli (teresa.montaruli@unige.ch)

All applications must be received by ISSI no later than January 12, 2024.

Full Job Announcement and Applications >>

Michael R. Meyer has been selected as the Johannes Geiss Fellow 2024

The International Space Science Institute ISSI is proud to announce

Prof. Michael R. Meyer

(University of Michigan, USA) as the Johannes Geiss Fellow 2024.

Michael R. Meyer, Johannes Geiss Fellow 2024

Michael R. Meyer has been a Professor of Astronomy at the University of Michigan since 2016. He was Chair of Star and Planet Formation at the ETH in Zürich (2009-2016) and was formerly a Professor/Astronomer at the Department of Astronomy/Steward Observatory of the University of Arizona (2000-2009). He was a Hubble Fellow at the University of Arizona (1997-2000) and did a post-doc at the Max-Planck-Institute for Astronomie (1995-1997). Prof. Meyer is a world recognized expert in the formation, evolution, and characterisation of planetary systems, and associated implications on the prospects for life in the Universe. He has also been deeply involved in the development of ground- and space-based instrumentation, including both the NIRCam and NIRISS instruments for the James Webb Space Telescope as well as high contrast imaging systems/spectrographs for 6-10 meter telescopes and next generation extremely large telescopes. Prof. Meyer will visit ISSI in the summer of 2024.

 

 

The Fellowship is named after Prof. Johannes Geiss, the founder of the institute.