Abstract:

The FORMOSAT-3 Project is also named Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere and Climate, or FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC (F3/C) for short. The project is targeted to place six micro-satellites into six different orbits with 72-deg inclination at 700~800 kilometer above the earth ground. These satellites orbit around the earth to form a low-earth-orbit constellation that conduct radio occultation (RO) by receiving signals transmitted by the 24 US GPS satellites. The satellite observation covers the entire global atmosphere (temperature and water vapor pressure profiles) and ionosphere, providing over 2,500 global RO sounding data (electron density and S4 scintillation profiles) per day since 15 April 2006. This for the first time allows scientists observing the 3D ionospheric electron density structure and dynamics. Ionospheric weathers response to solar wind, solar eclipse, magnetic storm, earthquake/tsunami, etc. are presented. Following the F3/C, FORMOSAT-7/COSMIC (F7/C2) consists of six small-satellites with 24-deg inclination and about 500 km altitude and six small-satellites with 72-deg inclination and about 800 km altitude will be launched in 2018 and 2020, respectively. Currently, NCU (National Central University) has been collaborating with NCAR (National Center for Atmospheric Research) and NOAA to develop ionospheric weather models by assimilating F3/C data into existing ionospheric models. The developed models with F3/C and F7/C2 data shall be open to the space weather and its related communities in the near future.

Biodata:

LIU, Jann-Yenq (Tiger) is a chair professor at National Central University, Taiwan. His research specialty is ionospheric pulsation, ionospheric radio, GPS geoscience applications, ionospheric modeling, and lithosphere-atmosphere-ionospheric coupling. He is the member of AGU, EGU, AOGS, CGU, and JpGU. Prof. Liu received BS, Atmospheric Physics Department, National Central University, TAIWAN in 1980, as well as MS and PhD, Physics Department, Utah State University, USA in 1988 and 1990, respectively. He was Associated Professor at Institute of Space Science, as well as Center for Space and Remote Sensing Research, National Central University, TAIWAN during 1990-1997, and has been Professor since 1997. He also served as Chief Scientist of National Space Organization (NSPO) in Taiwan during 2011-2015. His research areas are in ionospheric space weather (solar flare, solar eclipse, and magnetic storm signatures), ionospheric data assimilation, ionospheric radar science, space- and ground-based GPS geosciences applications (ionospheric total electron content, TEC), seismo-traveling ionospheric disturbance (ionospheric tsunami signature), and seismo-ionospheric precursors. He has been publishing more than 250 referred journal papers since 1988.

Abstract:

Inter-university Upper atmosphere Global Observation NETwork (IUGONET) is a Japanese inter-university project, which provides research infrastructure for sharing ground-based observational data of upper atmosphere. We present the activities made by IUGONET for upper atmospheric research. The upper atmospheric science is characterized by the following properties: (1) Both vertical coupling between multiple spheres and global horizontal circulation are essential. (2) There are a variety of data sets obtained by many kinds of instruments. (3) It is important to monitor the long-term trend. In order to study phenomena in the upper atmosphere, therefore, it is necessary to analyze various data. However, it is often difficult to search and access the data, because database has been built and maintained individually by each university or institute. In addition, there are a variety of data sets, resulting in many types of file formats, so collection and analysis of the data are time-consuming.To overcome these issues, we have mainly developed two tools; one is a metadata database for cross-searching various kinds of the upper atmospheric data distributed across the IUGONET members, and the other is an analysis software for visualizing and analyzing these data in an integrated fashion. We adopted Space Physics Archive Search and Extract (SPASE) metadata model as a basis of the IUGONET metadata format. We have already registered more than 10 million metadata to our metadata database. Our analysis software is based on Space Physics Environment Data Analysis Software (SPEDAS), which is a grass-roots data analysis software written in Interactive Data Language (IDL) for the space physics community and supports multiple missions. We have provided a plug-in software for SPEDAS, which enables users to deal with the IUGONET data on SPEDAS. Furthermore, we have held meetings about twice a year to introduce how to use these IUGONET data and tools.

Biodata:

Yoshimasa Tanaka received his Ph.D. in Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Graduate School of Science, Kyushu University, Japan in 2000. After that, he worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at Venture Business Laboratory, Kyushu University (from 2002 to 2003), an expert researcher at National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (from 2003 to 2006), a project researcher at Transdisciplinary Research Integration Center, Research Organization of Information and Systems (from 2006 to 2009), and a project assistant professor at National Institute of Polar Research (NIPR), Japan (from 2009 to 2015). He has been a project associate professor at NIPR and at Department of Polar Science, SOKENDAI (The Graduate University for Advanced Studies) since April 2015. His research interest includes the development of metadata database and analysis software of upper atmospheric data as well as the study on magnetosphere - ionosphere coupling processes in the auroral region.

Abstract:

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology through its Space Weather Service (SWS) provides ionospheric products and services to a diverse group of customers. Research and development within SWS is focussed both on developing tailored products and services for the key customer groups, and supporting the Australian Space Forecast Centre (ASFC) operations. This paper proposes an approach to regional ionospheric Total Electron Content (TEC) modelling using the Spherical Cap Harmonic Analysis (SCHA) and an Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis based data assimilation model to map the ionospheric layer parameter foF2. The SCHA model is based on longitudinal expansion in Fourier series and fractional Legendre colatitudinal functions over a spherical cap-like region including the Australian continent. In the assimilative model, EOF patterns and observations are assimilated to obtain the observed EOF coefficients used to construct the Australian region foF2 maps. We outline the design of the assimilative model and the chosen parameters.

Biodata:

Zahra is a space weather researcher at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology Space Weather Services. She has previously worked at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation. She obtained her PhD in Atmospheric Physics from New South Wales University in 2008. She has been a space weather forecaster at the Australian Space Forecast Centre since 2011. Zahra's research mainly concern the regional Ionospheric specification and forecasting using Global Navigation Satellite System techniques. She is the secretary of the Asia Oceania Geosciences Society Solar Terrestrial section. She collaborates with the Asia Oceania Space Weather Alliance to join international efforts on increasing awareness of space weather and the future directions of space weather forecasting.

Abstract:

Biomass burning activities is a repeated problem not only in the equatorial Southeast Asia particularly during the burning season but throughout the world. Remote sensing is a technique that can detect and monitor the active fires, smoke plumes and air pollution. The talk will review current and future geostationary satellite sensors and the capabilities for active fire detection and pre- and post-fire monitoring applications such as fire risks, surface albedo monitoring, and burned area mapping.

Biodata:

Mastura Mahmud is a Professor at the Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). She is currently the Deputy Dean of Research and Innovation at the Faculty. She was previously the Head of the Earth Observation Centre (EOC), which is a centre of excellence at the Faculty, from 2004 to 2012. Mastura's area of specialisation is meteorology and she has written a book on the haze report published by the Department of Environment, Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment in 2007, entitled Report on the Scientific Event Haze Peninsular Malaysia in August 2005: Part I - Major Contributors of Haze Which Hit Malaysia in 2005. She has also written a book on Transboundary Pollution: Tracking through Remote Sensing for her Professorial Inaugural Lecture in 2014. She was also involved as a representative of the Global Observation of Forest Cover Dynamics-Global Land Observation (GOFC-GOLD) Regional Network and was a member of the GOFC-GOLD Fire Network implementation team under the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). In addition, she was appointed by the Department of Environment as a member of the expert group on the formation of the ambient air quality standards in 2012 and a member of the working group on the preparation of greenhouse gas inventories for the 3rd Report of the National Communication to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).