HR: 16:30h
AN: SP44A-05    [Abstracts]
TI: Preliminary Three Dimensional CME Mass and Energy Using Solar Mass Ejection Imager (SMEI) Data
AU: * Jackson, B V
EM: bvjackson@ucsd.edu
AF: Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093 United States
AU: Buffington, A
EM: abuffington@ucsd.edu
AF: Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093 United States
AU: Hick, P P
EM: pphick@ucsd.edu
AF: Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093 United States
AU: Yu, Y
EM: yyu@cs.ucsd.edu
AF: Center for Astrophysics and Space Sciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093 United States
AU: Webb, D
EM: david.webb@hanscom.af.mil
AF: ISR, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA 01731 United States
AU: Mizuno, D
EM: Don.Mizuno@hanscom.af.mil
AF: ISR, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA 01731 United States
AU: Kuchar, T
EM: thomas.kuchar@hanscom.af.mil
AF: ISR, Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA 01731 United States
AB: White-light Thomson scattering observations from the Solar Mass Ejection Imager (SMEI) have recorded the inner heliospheric response to several hundred CMEs including the May 28, 2003 halo CME, the October 28, 2003 halo CME, and numerous other heliospheric structures. Here we show the extent of several well-observed CMEs in SMEI observations, and show how we are able to track events from their first measurements in SMEI approximately 20° from the solar disk until they vanish from the SMEI 180° field of view. Several portions of large CMEs observed by the LASCO coronagraphs can be tracked into the interplanetary medium associated with the initial CME response and the underlying erupting prominence structure. We use a 3D reconstruction technique that obtains perspective views from outward-flowing solar wind as observed from Earth, iteratively fitting a kinematic solar wind density model using the SMEI white light observations and, when available, the Solar-Terrestrial Environment Laboratory (STELab), Japan interplanetary scintillation (IPS) velocity data. This 3D modeling technique allows us to separate the heliospheric response in SMEI from background noise, and to estimate the 3D structure of the CME and its mass. For instance, the analysis shows and tracks outward the northward portion of the loop structure of the October 28, 2003 CME observed as a halo in LASCO images that passes Earth on October 29. We determine an excess mass for this structure of 6.7×10¹⁶g and a total mass including an ambient background of 8.3×10¹⁶g. The very fast structure compared in a 3D pixel to pixel comparison with the IPS velocity data gives a kinetic energy for the northward portion of this event of 2.0×10³⁴erg as it passes Earth.
UR: http://cass185.ucsd.edu/smei/smei.html
DE: 2111 Ejecta, driver gases, and magnetic clouds
DE: 2164 Solar wind plasma
DE: 2194 Instruments and techniques
DE: 7513 Coronal mass ejections
DE: 7594 Instruments and techniques
SC: Solar Physics Division - AAS [SP]
MN: 2005 Joint Assembly