Science Objectives

From RHESSI Wiki

Latest revision as of 22:47, 15 October 2008

Primary Mission Objective

Explore the basic physics of particle acceleration and energy release in solar flares Science Objectives

Solar Objectives

• Determine the frequency, location, and evolution of impulsive energy release in the corona
• Study the acceleration of electrons, protons, and heavier ions in flares
• Study the heating of plasma to tens of millions of degrees and determine its relationship to particle acceleration
• Study the propagation and evolution of energetic particles in flares
• Determine the relative abundances of accelerated and ambient ions in flares

Non-Solar Objectives

• Obtain images and spectra of the Crab Nebula with 2 arcsecond spatial resolution and ~1 keV spectral resolution
• Detect and obtain high resolution spectra of gamma-ray bursts and cosmic and terrestrial transient sources over a large fraction of the sky
• Search for cyclotron line features in gamma-ray bursts and cosmic transient sources
• Obtain high resolution spectra and search for line features in steady X-ray and gamma-ray sources

Primary Observations

Simultaneous, high resolution imaging and spectroscopy of solar flares from 3 keV X-rays to 17 MeV gamma rays with high time resolution

Expected Numbers of Flares:

• Tens of thousands of microflares
• Over a thousand X-ray flares with crude imaging and spectra to >100 keV
• Hundreds of flares with >1000 counts per second above 20 keV, allowing spatial changes to be followed on timescales of 0.1 seconds.
• Tens of flares sufficiently intense to allow the finest possible imaging spectroscopy
• Up to 100 flares with the detection of gamma-ray lines
• Tens of flares with detailed gamma-ray line spectroscopy and the location and extent of the source determined to ~40 arcseconds