Sun  ID: 4898

Heliophysics Sentinels 2022

There has been one significant change since the 2020 Heliophysics Fleet. SET has been decommissioned. As of Fall 2022, here's a tour of the NASA Heliophysics fleet from the near-Earth satellites out to the Voyagers beyond the heliopause.

Excepting the Voyager missions, the satellite orbits are color coded for their observing program:

  • Magenta: TIM (Thermosphere, Ionosphere, Mesosphere) observations
  • Yellow: solar observations and imagery
  • Cyan: Geospace and magnetosphere
  • Violet: Heliospheric observations



Near-Earth Fleet:

  • Hinode: Observes the Sun in multiple wavelengths up to x-rays. SVS page
  • TIMED: Studies the upper layers (40-110 miles up) of Earth's atmosphere. SVS page
  • ICON: Works with GOLD on studies of the ionosphere.
  • AIM: Images and measures noctilucent clouds. SVS page
  • IRIS: Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph is designed to take high-resolution spectra and images of the region between the solar photosphere and solar atmosphere. SVS page

Geosynchronous Fleet:

  • SDO: Solar Dynamics Observatory keeps the Sun under continuous observation at 16 megapixel resolution. SVS page
  • GOLD: Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk is a spectroscopic imager for studying the ionosphere.

Geospace Fleet:

Lunar Orbiting Fleet:

  • THEMIS-ARTEMIS: Two of the THEMIS satellites were moved into lunar orbit to study the interaction of the Earth's magnetosphere with the Moon. SVS page

Sun-Earth Lagrange Point One Fleet:

The L1 point is a Lagrange Point between the Sun and the Earth. Spacecraft can orbit this location for continuous coverage of the Sun.
  • SOHO: Studies the Sun with cameras and a multitude of other instruments. SVS page
  • ACE: Measures the composition and characteristics of the solar wind. SVS page
  • Wind: Measures particle flows and fields in the solar wind. SVS page

Solar Orbiting Fleet:


Interstellar Fleet:

  • Voyager 1 & Voyager 2: The two Voyager spaceraft orbit originally performed flybys of the outer planets of the solar system but continued to operate. They are now the most distant monitors of the plasma in the space between the stars. At the time of this visualization, Voyager 2 has just crossed the heliopause.SVS page
 

Older Version


Visualization Credits

Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Lead Visualizer
Laurence Schuler (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Technical Support
Ian Jones (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Technical Support
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4898

Missions:
ACE
THEMIS and ARTEMIS
Geotail
Hinode (Solar-b)
IBEX
Ionospheric Connection Explorer (ICON)
IRIS: Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph
Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS)
SDO
SOHO
Parker Solar Probe
Solar Orbiter Collaboration
STEREO
THEMIS
TIMED
Voyager
Wind
Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD)

Data Used:
SSCweb also referred to as: SSCweb ephemerides
Ephemeris - NASA/GSFC Space Physics Data Facility - 2022-04-26T00:00:00 UTC - 2022-10-18T00:00:00 UTC
Satellite ephemerides
Space-Track Two-Line Elements also referred to as: Space-Track TLE
Ephemeris - NORAD - 2022-04-26T00:00:00 UTC - 2022-10-18T00:00:00 UTC
Satellite ephemerides
DE 431
Ephemeris - JPL - 2022-04-26T00:00:00 UTC - 2022-10-18T00:00:00 UTC
Planetary ephemerides SPICE kernel
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of this series:
Heliophysics Fleet

Keywords:
SVS >> SOHO
SVS >> Hyperwall
SVS >> Solar Dynamics Observatory
SVS >> Heliophysics
SVS >> ACE
SVS >> Hinode
SVS >> STEREO
SVS >> Spacecraft >> Voyager
SVS >> Satellite Orbit
SVS >> MMS
NASA Science >> Sun
SVS >> Solar Orbiter
SVS >> IRIS Mission
SVS >> Parker Solar Probe