NASA has extended the operations of the Center for Geospace Storms by five more years to complete a computer model that can provide a better understanding of space weather and physics.
Johns Hopkins University‘s Applied Physics Laboratory, CGS lead, said Wednesday work will continue on the Multiscale Atmosphere-Geospace Environment system that is expected to accurately simulate solar storms in the geospace.
With MAGE, APL researchers and colleagues across the U.S. are aiming at achieving an unprecedented feat of combining models of Earth’s magnetosphere, ionosphere and upper and lower atmosphere to help predict space weather events that could disrupt operations both in orbit and on the ground.
The system has already provided new insights into geospace physics that include the string of pearls phenomenon involving auroras.
“MAGE is bringing a capability that we haven’t seen in the community before: the ability to get down to smaller-scale features and help place them in a global context,” explained Mike Wilterberger, deputy director of CGS.
The five-year extension of CGS operations represents Phase II of the NASA Diversity, Realize, Integrate, Venture, Educate Science Center initiative.