Abstract

Contributed Talk - Splinter Solar

Wednesday, 23 September 2020, 16:30   (virtual room L)

SUNRISE III: High-resolution exploration of the solar atmospheric stratification

Andreas Lagg, Sunrise III Consortium composed of MPS, KIS, IAA, NAOJ, JHUAPL
MPI für Sonnensystemforschung

Scheduled for a launch in 2022, the balloon-borne solar observatory SUNRISE III will provide a close-up view of the processes in the solar atmosphere with a completely new suite of instruments attached to the 1-meter solar telescope. The diffraction limited performance of the telescope (70 km spatial resolution) combined with the simultaneous measurements of many Fraunhofer lines between 300 and 860 nm allows determining atmospheric conditions at an unprecedented height resolution. The determined parameters include the magnetic field vector, the temperature stratification and the gas/plasma velocities. The seeing-free, stable observing conditions provide constant-quality, high-cadence and long-duration time series, essential for the study of waves propagating from the deepest layers of the photosphere up to chromospheric heights. In addition, the observations from the stratosphere bear a big discovery potential for solar polarimetry in the UV spectral range from 300 to 400 nm, a wavelength range difficult to access for ground-based solar telescopes. The payload of SUNRISE III consists of three completely new instruments: Two slit-based spectro-polarimeters for the near ultra-violet (SUSI / MPS) and the near-infrared (SCIP / NAOJ), and an imaging spectro-polarimeter (TuMag /IAA). In this presentation we will highlight some major results of the previous two SUNRISE flights, present an overview of the new SUNRISE III instrumentation and the status of the project, and provide an outlook to the expected scientific return. SUNRISE III is a joint project of the German Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung together with the Spanish SUNRISE consortium, the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, USA, the German Leibniz Institut für Sonnenphysik, the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and the Japan Aerospace eXploration Agency.