Abstract
The Wide-field Imager for the Parker Solar Probe (PSP/WISPR) comprises two telescopes that record white-light total brightness \([B]\) images of the solar corona. Their fields of view cover a widely changing range of heliocentric heights over the 24 highly eccentric orbits planned for the mission. In this work, the capability of PSP/WISPR data to carry out tomographic reconstructions of the three-dimensional (3D) distribution of the coronal electron density is investigated. Based on the precise orbital information of the mission, \(B\)-images for Orbits 1, 12, and 24 are synthesized from a 3D magnetohydrodynamic model of the corona. For each orbit, the time series of synthetic images is used to carry out a tomographic reconstruction of the coronal electron density and results are compared with the model. As the PSP perihelion decreases, the range of heights that can be tomographically reconstructed progressively shifts to lower values, and the period required to gather the data decreases. For Orbit 1 tomographic reconstruction is not possible. For Orbit 12, tomographic reconstruction is possible in the heliocentric height range \({\approx}\, 5\,\mbox{--}\,15~\mathrm{{R}_{\odot}}\), over a region spanning up to \({\approx}\,160^{\circ}\) in Carrington longitude, with data gathered over a \({\approx}\, 3.4\) day-long period. For Orbit 24, tomographic reconstruction is possible in the heliocentric height range \({\approx}\,3\,\mbox{--}\,10~\mathrm {R}_{\odot}\), over a region spanning up to \({\approx} \,170^{\circ}\) in Carrington longitude, with data gathered over a \({\approx}\, 2.8\) day-long period.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Altschuler, M.D., Perry, R.M.: 1972, On determining the electron density distribution of the solar corona from K-coronameter data. Solar Phys. 23, 410. DOI . ADS .
Butala, M.D., Hewett, R.J., Frazin, R.A., Kamalabadi, F.: 2010, Dynamic three-dimensional tomography of the solar corona. Solar Phys. 262, 495. DOI . ADS .
Frazin, R.A.: 2000, Tomography of the solar corona. I. A robust, regularized, positive estimation method. Astrophys. J. 530, 1026. DOI . ADS .
Frazin, R.A., Janzen, P.: 2002, Tomography of the solar corona. II. Robust, regularized, positive estimation of the three-dimensional electron density distribution from LASCO-C2 polarized white-light images. Astrophys. J. 570, 408. DOI . ADS .
Frazin, R.A., Lamy, P., Llebaria, A., Vásquez, A.M.: 2010, Three-dimensional electron density from tomographic analysis of LASCO-C2 images of the K-corona total brightness. Solar Phys. 265, 19. DOI . ADS .
Gardès, B., Lamy, P., Llebaria, A.: 2013, Photometric calibration of the LASCO-C2 coronagraph over 14 years (1996 – 2009). Solar Phys. 283, 667. DOI . ADS .
Jackson, B.V., Hick, P.P., Buffington, A., Bisi, M.M., Clover, J.M., Tokumaru, M., Kojima, M., Fujiki, K.: 2011, Three-dimensional reconstruction of heliospheric structure using iterative tomography: a review. J. Atmos. Solar-Terr. Phys. 73, 1214. DOI . ADS .
Lamy, P., Boclet, B., Wojak, J., Vibert, D.: 2017, Anomalous surge of the white-light corona at the onset of the declining phase of solar cycle 24. Solar Phys. 292, 60. DOI . ADS .
Minnaert, M.: 1930, On the continuous spectrum of the corona and its polarisation. With 3 figures. (Received July 30, 1930). Z. Astrophys. 1, 209. ADS .
van de Hulst, H.C.: 1950, The electron density of the solar corona. Bull. Astron. Inst. Neth. 11, 135. ADS .
van der Holst, B., Sokolov, I.V., Meng, X., Jin, M., Manchester, W.B. IV, Tóth, G., Gombosi, T.I.: 2014, Alfvén Wave Solar Model (AWSoM): coronal heating. Astrophys. J. 782, 81. DOI . ADS .
Vibert, D., Peillon, C., Lamy, P., Frazin, R.A., Wojak, J.: 2016, Time-dependent tomographic reconstruction of the solar corona. Astron. Comput. 17, 144. DOI . ADS .
Vourlidas, A., Howard, R.A., Plunkett, S.P., Korendyke, C.M., Thernisien, A.F.R., Wang, D., Rich, N., Carter, M.T., Chua, D.H., Socker, D.G., Linton, M.G., Morrill, J.S., Lynch, S., Thurn, A., Van Duyne, P., Hagood, R., Clifford, G., Grey, P.J., Velli, M., Liewer, P.C., Hall, J.R., DeJong, E.M., Mikic, Z., Rochus, P., Mazy, E., Bothmer, V., Rodmann, J.: 2016, The Wide-Field Imager for Solar Probe Plus (WISPR). Space Sci. Rev. 204, 83. DOI . ADS .
Xiong, M., Davies, J.A., Feng, X., Li, B., Yang, L., Xia, L., Harrison, R.A., Hayashi, K., Li, H., Zhou, Y.: 2018, Prospective white-light imaging and in situ measurements of quiescent large-scale solar-wind streams from the Parker solar probe and solar orbiter. Astrophys. J. 868, 137. DOI . ADS .
Acknowledgments
The authors are grateful for the careful read of the manuscript by the anonymous referee, which resulted in improved content and clarity of exposition. A.M. Vásquez was partially supported by ANPCyT grant PICT-2016/0221 and CONICET grant PIP-11220120100403 to IAFE. A. Vourlidas was supported by the WISPR directed work at APL ILC0381D. W.B. Manchester IV was supported by NSF project FAIN 1663800 and NASA project NNX16AL12G. R.A. Howard was supported by grants from NASA for the WISPR and SECCHI programs.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.
Additional information
Publisher’s Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Vásquez, A.M., Frazin, R.A., Vourlidas, A. et al. Tomography of the Solar Corona with the Wide-Field Imager for the Parker Solar Probe. Sol Phys 294, 81 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11207-019-1471-1
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11207-019-1471-1