CEDAR email: Reminder: CEDAR 2012 workshop "In situ measurements of the mesosphere-lower thermosphere (MLT) by commercial suborbital spacecraft."

[Rymer, Abigail M.]

Reminder about CEDAR workshop:

"In situ measurements of the mesosphere-lower thermosphere (MLT) by commercial suborbital spacecraft."

Please see session summary copied below and let us know if you would like to participate, if convenient please also send a brief summary of your presentation/discussion topic in advance.

Provisional participant list:

H.Todd Smith, Introduction to research opportunities using commercial sub-orbital spacecraft.
Lars Dyrud, Introduction to scientific investigations enabled by sub-orbital spacecraft.
Robert Pfaff, History of sub-orbital research. (TBC) 
Meers Oppenheim, The plasma environment at 100 km.
Gerald Lehmacher, In situ measurements of electron and neutral density fluctuations in the daytime mesosphere.
Abigail Rymer, Atmospheric anions at Enceladus, Titan (and Earth).
John Olivero, (TBC)

Hope to see you there!
Lars, Todd and Abi

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Dear Colleagues,

Please consider submitting a presentation to CEDAR 2012 workshop "In situ measurements of the mesosphere-lower thermosphere (MLT) by commercial suborbital spacecraft."
Monday June 25th 16:00-18:00 PM.

Conveners:
Lars Dyrud, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, lars.dyrud at jhuapl.edu
Abigail Rymer, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, abigail.rymer at jhuapl.edu
H.Todd Smith, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, h.todd.smith at jhuapl.edu

Summary:
The emergence of commercial spacecraft will provide frequent and low cost access to 60-120 km altitude;
with multiple flights per day, gathering about 10 minutes of data per flight. Initially all the flights will be from the same location (probably New Mexico) and during the day. If, as seems likely, the use of sub-orbital vehicles for space-borne science investigations gains traction it is hoped that flights will launch from different locations and include night-time flights. These flights can be coordinated with observations done by ground-based radar measurements such as Arecibo and SuperDARN to help characterize the lower E- and D-region plasma environment of the ionosphere. 

For this workshop we encourage participation from community members to explore what measurements (including coordinated observation campaigns) can be made to help us better understand this region in general. What in situ measurements should be made in order to characterize the region and to study specific peculiar phenomena observed in this region of the Earth's atmosphere such as high altitude lightning, sprites, nocti-luminescent and polar-mesospheric clouds. 

Please let us know if you would like to present at the workshop, both formal presentations and general suggestions for discussions topics are welcome, we hope to see you there!

Best regards,
Abi Rymer

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Dr. Abigail M. Rymer                   The Johns Hopkins University,
abigail.rymer at jhuapl.edu              Applied Physics Laboratory,
Tel: +1 443-778-2736                 11100 Johns Hopkins Road,
Fax: +1 443-778-0386                 Laurel, MD 20723-6099
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