Predictive Science, Inc. has unveiled a forecast image of what the view of the sun’s corona should look like during the total solar eclipse on Monday. On their website, Predictive Science, Inc. says, “Our work is supported by NASA (Heliophysics Supporting Research and Living with a Star programs), AFOSR, and NSF. We are grateful to NASA’s Advanced Supercomputing Division (NAS) for an allocation on the Pleiades supercomputer, and the Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE) for allocations on Stampede2 at theTexas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) and Comet at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC), which allowed us to complete the eclipse prediction simulations shown here. We also thank the SDO/HMI team of the Solar Physics Group at Stanford University for their support in providing timely access to HMI Synoptic magnetograph data.”
The prediction is based on a magnetohydrodynamic model of the solar corona with improved energy transport; theyapplied a A wave-turbulence-driven (WTD) methodology to heat the corona. For their final prediction,magnetic shear along polarity inversion lines (PILs – lines separating positive and negative polarity regions) were introduced where filament channels were observed in EUV emission by SDO/AIA. According to Predictive Science, the handedness of the shear is deduced from the combination of a magnetofrictional model and a surface flux transport model.
NASA is deploying aircraft during the eclipse to photograph and take measurements of the corona; their studies will help verify whether or not this forecast is accurate. Citizen scientists on Earth are also encouraged to share their photographs and findings throughout the eclipse.
