Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Jun 2006
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006spd....37.0613m&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, SPD meeting #37, #6.13
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
Scientific paper
The sole scientific objective of the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) is investigation of the global interaction between the heliosphere and the interstellar cloud. The solar wind carves out a void - the heliosphere - into the surrounding interstellar plasma. At a distance of about 100 AU the solar wind slows down to subsonic speed, thus forming the termination shock. Here ions are accelerated, preferably those created from inflowing interstellar gas and picked up by the solar wind. Through charge exchange with interstellar gas accelerated ions form energetic neutral at-oms (ENA), which - if released towards Earth - will arrive on a straight trajectory, carrying information on energy spectra and spatial distribution of these ions. Because the sun moves relative to the local interstellar cloud at about 26 km/s a neutral wind blows through our solar system, and this gas flow can be directly probed for several species near Earth. IBEX will address the following key questions: (I) What is the global strength and structure of the termination shock? (II) How are energetic protons accelerated at the termination shock? (III) What are the global properties of the solar wind flow beyond the termination shock and in the heliotail? (IV) How does the interstellar flow interact with the heliosphere beyond the heliopause? To answer these questions IBEX will take global images of the termination shock over the energy range 10 - 6000 eV and capture the interstellar O inflow with two highly sensitive energetic neutral atom ENA cameras. The payload and the spacecraft are currently under development for flight with the launch scheduled for June 2008. By then IBEX will join the Great Sun Solar System Observatory that consists of the Voyagers, Ulysses, and several spacecraft at 1 AU for a synergistic observation of the three-dimensional heliosphere.
IBEX Team
McComas Dave
Moebius Eberhard
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