NATIONAL OBSERVATORY OF ATHENS (GR)
The main goal of the Swarm-AWARE project is to apply innovative techniques and deliver new scientific discoveries of the Earth system, pertinent to space weather (SWE) and natural hazards (NH) effects. Relevant achievements are made through a systematic investigation of Swarm-derived indices related to magnetospheric substorm activity, field-aligned currents (FACs), magnetic storm activity, ultra-low frequency (ULF) plasma waves and equatorial Spread-F (ESF) events (plasma bubbles). Both scientific targets have great societal impacts, since SWE effects can include damage and disruption to power distribution networks on the ground, while NH can result in a broad range of effects, from various perturbations of the ionosphere and related disruptions of, e.g., positioning (GPS, GNSS, Galileo) or telecommunication services (notably affected also by strong SWE events), up to most severe consequences, including the loss of human lives.
We tackle this great challenge through the use of state-of-the-art machine learning (ML) and advanced time series analysis (TSA) techniques. The Swarm-AWARE project exploits the unique capabilities of the Swarm mission data, including multi-point observations, together, significantly, with complementary ground data (e.g., SuperMAG magnetometer network and all-sky cameras). Furthermore, in addition to exploiting the unique nature of these combined data sets, Swarm-AWARE highlights potential new foci for future Swarm scientific studies. This research also investigates concepts for potentially new Swarm data products, which address the challenges associated with the impact of geological hazards (e.g., earthquakes, volcanic eruptions) at middle to low latitudes. In parallel, by providing longer time series of the Swarm-derived SFAC index, together with Swarm AE-like and Swarm SYM-H-like geomagnetic activity indices, that currently exist, Swarm-AWARE helps to shed new light on the North-South ionospheric asymmetry observed at high latitudes.
Swarm-AWARE is very timely given the increased geomagnetic activity associated with the maximum phase of solar cycle 25: on 11th of May 2024 a magnetic storm occurred with a minimum Dst index value of -412 nT, the strongest magnetic storm of the last 20 years (since the Halloween 2003 storm). It is also very interesting to attempt to derive the mentioned Swarm indices using the recently released Swarm FAST data for selected major storm events. This highlights further the benefits of Swarm as a SWE mission.
The Swarm-AWARE consortium, consisting of the National Observatory of Athens / Institute for Astronomy, Astrophysics, Space Applications and Remote Sensing (NOA/IAASARS), the Institute for Space Sciences (ISS) Bucharest, and Ewa Slominska “OBSEE”, provides the necessary background, commitment, expertise and quality to accomplish the objectives of the Swarm-AWARE project.
