STSE Swarm + Innovation Program

ESA STSE (the Support To Science Element) Swarm+Innovation Program is a programmatic component of EOEP (Earth Observation Envelope Programme).

• Polar Cap Products (PCP)
• Swarm for earthquake study (SAFE)
• Magnetic Tidal Signals and Their Use in Mapping the Electrical Conductivity of the Lithosphere and Upper Mantle

Polar Cap Products (PCP)

In this project, Polar Cap Products (PCP) based on in-situ data from the Swarm satellites are developed. PCP will provide essential information on polar cap patches, which are an important element of space weather in the polar regions. PCP will allow establishing models for the space weather forecasting at high latitudes. The objectives of this project are:
(a) Automatic detection of polar cap patches and calculating the corresponding polar cap patch index;
(b) Estimation of the gradient drift instability growth time within the polar cap patch.
Polar cap patches are regions of enhanced plasma density in the ionospheric F region inside the polar cap, i.e., poleward of the auroral oval. The plasma density of polar cap patches is more than twice that of the background. Polar cap patches are convected over the magnetic poles from the dayside towards nightside.

More information about this project can be found at
http://www.mn.uio.no/fysikk/english/research/projects/swarm/
This project is funded by ESA, Contract No. 4000114121/15/NL/MP.

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Swarm for earthquake study (SAFE)

SAFE is a project to investigate, by means of data collected from satellites and from ground-based instruments, the phase preceding the great earthquakes with the aim to identify any electromagnetic signal from space. To achieve the scope, SAFE will study the preparatory phase of large earthquakes through the analysis of electromagnetic data from sensors on board the three satellites of ESA Swarm constellation in order to better understand the physical mechanisms involved. In particular, the project will study the coupling between the outer part of the solid Earth, the lithosphere, where the earthquakes occur, and the overlying fluid portion, the atmosphere. The objective is to capture the information exchanged between the two layers through the integration of the data acquired by the Swarm satellites with those collected by other satellites and by ground-based stations.

More information about this project can be found at
http://safe-swarm.ingv.it
This project is funded by ESA, Contract No. 4000116832/15/NL/MP.

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Magnetic Tidal Signals and Their Use in Mapping the Electrical Conductivity of the Lithosphere and Upper Mantle

This project aims to use the magnetic fields produced from ocean tides to probe the conductivity of Earth's lithosphere and upper mantle. ESA Swarm constellation mission provides good spatial data coverage and gives the possibility of obtaining global images of 3-D mantle heterogeneities, especially in oceanic regions. The objectives of this project are:
(a) To investigate how sensitive tidal EM signals to conductivity changes at LUM (10-400 km) depths;
(b) To recover magnetic tidal signals from the Swarm magnetic data;
(c) To develop numerical schemes to use these magnetic tidal signals for probing the electrical conductivity at LUM depths;
(d) To constrain the LUM conductivity using tidal signals.

More information about this project can be found at
http://www.epm.ethz.ch/research/tides.html
Project duration: April 2015 - autumn 2016. This project is supported by ESA.

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