Earth Sun ID: 4762

GOLD Instrument observes the July 2019 Total Solar Eclipse

Visualizations by Tom Bridgman Released on December 10, 2019

The GOLD instrument aboard the SES 14 satellite observes the Earth in ultraviolet light. In this region of the electromagnetic spectrum, it sees emission of atmospheric ions, atoms and molecules activated by incoming solar radiation.

In these visualizations, we see how the total solar eclipse of July 2012 significantly affected this emission as the Moon's shadow moved across Earth. We also show wavelengths corresponding to two different populations of emitting atoms, the nitrogen LBH bands and the oxygen 135.6nm emission which has a strong contribution from ionized oxygen atoms.

Because the oxygen ions are charged, they respond to the electromagnetic force and exhibit some enhancement straddling the magnetic equator - the Appleton anomaly, which is created by a process called the 'fountain effect'. The nitrogen emission, from atoms with no net electric charge, does not respond to Earth's magnetic field so does not exhibit the Appleton anomaly.

Comparative visualizations of Earth in the ultraviolet emission of oxygen recombining from ions and ultraviolet emission of the nitrogen Lyman-Birge-Hopfield (LBH) bands. In the oxygen version, the Appleton anomaly is faintly visible above and below the equator on the nightside of the Earth. This version presents the path of the solar eclipse but variations are available in the popup menu to the right.

Visualization Credits

Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Lead Visualizer
Kathalina Tran (SGT): Lead Producer
Genna Duberstein (USRA): Lead Producer
Saurav Aryal (LASP, University of Colorado Boulder): Scientist
Laurence Schuler (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Technical Support
Ian Jones (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Technical Support

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4762

Mission:
Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD)

Data Used:

CPC (Climate Prediction Center) Cloud Composite

Data Compilation - Climate Prediction Center (CPC) - 2019-06-30T06:22:00UTC - 2019-07-02T22:520:00UTC

Global cloud cover from multiple satellites

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SES 14/GOLD

Observed Data - 2019-06-30T06:22:00UTC - 2019-07-02T22:520:00UTC

Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD) is an ultraviolet imaging spectrograph to measure temperatures and densities in the Earth's thermosphere & ionosphere.

view all stories where this data set is used