日本地球惑星科学連合2018年大会

講演情報

[EE] ポスター発表

セッション記号 P (宇宙惑星科学) » P-EM 太陽地球系科学・宇宙電磁気学・宇宙環境

[P-EM12] Space Weather, Space Climate, and VarSITI

2018年5月24日(木) 10:45 〜 12:15 ポスター会場 (幕張メッセ国際展示場 7ホール)

コンビーナ:片岡 龍峰(国立極地研究所)、Antti A Pulkkinen (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center)、草野 完也(名古屋大学宇宙地球環境研究所、共同)、塩川 和夫(名古屋大学宇宙地球環境研究所)

[PEM12-P16] Muon flux measurements during the 2017 total solar eclipse

*Katerina Merrill1Kim Nielsen1 (1.Department of Physics, Utah Valley University)

キーワード:space weather, cosmic rays, solar eclipse

Cosmic rays are high energetic particles impacting upon the Earth’s atmosphere leaving trails of fundamental particles such as pions, kaons, and muons, which decay into additional particles through cascade processes. These cosmic rays originate mainly from sources outside our solar system but a small fraction originate in the Sun. The objective of this experiment was to determine whether the incidence of secondary cosmic rays fluctuated during the 2017 total solar eclipse, with the hypothesis that the part of the atmosphere directly in the shadow of the Moon would contain fewer muons. As part of the experiment, a muon detector was deployed near the centre of totality in Wyoming, USA. The data acquisition was performed over several hours to establish baselines before and after the eclipse. When a muon enters the detector, it loses some of its kinetic energy, which is then transferred into the atoms of a fluorescent emitter leading to light emission detectable by photomultiplying tubes. In this presentation, we detail the physics behind secondary cosmic rays, the detection unit, and the space weather impact of the 2017 solar eclipse on cosmic rays reaching the Earth’s surface.