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Active Precipitation of Radiation Belt Electrons using Rocket Exhaust Driven Amplification (REDA) of Man-Made Whistlers
  • Paul Bernhardt
Paul Bernhardt
University of Alaska Fairbanks

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Abstract

Ground-based VLF transmitters located around the 2 world generate signals that leak through the bottom side of the 3 ionosphere in the form of whistler mode waves. Wave and particle 4 measurements on satellites have observed that these man-made 5 VLF waves can be strong enough to scatter trapped energetic 6 electrons into low pitch angle orbits, causing loss by absorption in 7 the lower atmosphere. This precipitation loss process is greatly 8 enhanced by intentional amplification of the whistler waves using 9 a newly discovered process called Rocket Exhaust Driven 10 Amplification (REDA). Satellite measurements of REDA have 11 shown between 30-and 50-dB intensification of VLF waves in 12 space using a 60-second burn of the 150 g/s thruster on the Cygnus 13 satellite that services the International Space Station (ISS). This 14 controlled amplification process is adequate to deplete the 15 energetic particle population in the radiation belts in a few minutes 16 rather than the multi-day period it would take naturally. 17 Numerical simulations of the pitch angle diffusion for radiation 18 belt particles use the UCLA quasi-linear Fokker Planck model 19 (QLFP) to assess the impact of REDA on radiation belt 20 remediation (RBR) of newly injected energetic electrons. The 21 simulated precipitation fluxes of energetic electrons are applied to 22 models of D-region electron density and bremsstrahlung x-rays for 23 predictions of the modified environment that can be observed with 24 satellite and ground-based sensors. 25 26 Index Terms-Active Space Experiments, Parametric