Multi-Spacecraft Connectivity
An outcome from our coronal modeling of the 2024 eclipse was discovery that the magnetic connectivity of a time-evolving model is fundamentally different than a time-stationary one (Lionello et al. 2026). As a result, for the 2026 prediction campaign, we added the inner heliospheric domain to the live data-driven modeling pipeline. This allows us to smoothly capture the time-evolving dynamics of the corona and solar wind all the way out to Earth’s location at one astronomical unit (au). This capability is essential for capturing the real-time dynamics of the solar wind that washes over the near-Earth environment and other satellites orbiting within the inner heliosphere.
Of particular interest to solar and heliospheric scientists is the instantaneous magnetic field connectivity from a given satellite to the solar surface. This connectivity is essential for determining the transport and impacts of solar energetic particls (SEPs) which travel along magnetic fields at large fractions of the speed of light.
In the above movies, we visualize the connectivity in several ways. The plots on the left show the spacecraft positions in angular Carrington coordinates as they move in time or for the time of totality on August 12. The straight lines connecting their positions indicates where their connected magnetic fields land on the surface. The blue and gold colors indicate where the magnetic flux is open on the Sun as well as the polarity. The plots on the right show a top-down heliospheric view of the magnetic field lines connected to each spacecraft. They are drawn by tracing field lines within a few degrees longitude of the spacecraft position and coloring the with a semi-transparent color. The more solid the field line, the closer to the true spacraft position.
All together, these illustrate the dynamic and constantly evolving magnetic field connectivity in a data-driven, data-assimilative heliosphere. For those interested, we also create summary movies for the Connectivity Prediction and Connectivity over Time for download (check back, they are updated as the simulation progresses).
Live Views from the Spacecraft
Understanding the magnetic connectivity of the Sun is also essential for the simultaneous interpretation of remote sensing observations of the solar corona (images, spectral lines) with in situ plasma measurements of the solar wind (measured locally by spacecraft). Models are a useful way to provide this context, and because of the connected coronal and heliospheric domains, we can easily display this information in near-real-time.
The plots below show the respective views of the solar disk from Earth, Solar Orbiter, Parker Solar Probe as well as a top-down polar view for broad longitudinal context. This enables one to quickly see where in the corona a given spacecraft maps from an imaging perspective. As before, one set of animations shows how the predicted connectivity for totality changes with time for each viewpoint, and the other shows their connectivity at each instant in time during the calculation. We hope that some of these views might be useful for observation planning prior to the eclipse and/or for interpreting data from multiple perspectives after the event.
