Release notes for the publication number can go here
The two STEREO spacecraft will be built by Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (Laurel, MD).
The two STEREO spacecraft are identical and designed for a 2 year mission. Most spacecraft operations (antenna pointing control, momentum management, power management, and thermal management) are autonomous.
STEREO's relevance to human life on Earth and the domestication of space provides a natural platform for enhancing the scientific and technological literacy of children and adults nationwide. Specifically, the spectacular imagery of the Sun and inner heliosphere to be obtained with SECCHI will provide unique opportunities for education and public outreach.
Here is a summary of SECCHI flat fields applied in secchi_prep.pro. (There is currently no correction applied to EUVI.)
This page provides information on the error in different sources of attitude history of the STEREO spacecraft as it relates to SECCHI COR 2 image headers. (Note that this is NOT a description of ACTUAL attitude! Here is a link to a plot of spacecraft roll. Headers from other telescopes may not exhibit this error if they have been reprocessed.
The following plots give an idea of the pointing changes which are incorporated into the Level-1 image header when SECCHI_PREP is used. These corrections come from files in $SSW_SECCHI/data/hi/. The plots are generated by plotsccpointing.pro.
All Pointing Corrections for Hi1 A and B (bottom of linked page)
For details of the calibration of the HI-1 instrument, please refer to this list of HI Calibration Papers (RAL)
The data used to create these plots are available in the ASCII files :
| SECCHI Shutter Mechanism Spin Times |
Polarizer Spin Timesas of 2017/12/21 (COR 1-B 2014/09/30) Note: For Feb.-Oct. 2012, the COR 1-B polarizer data points are a change from previous. A CCW test is done before the CW test. For previous CCW tests back in 2007, the mechanisms were first spun CW, then CCW. For 2012 the order was reversed. This change was implemented for all polarizers starting 2012/04/17, and then discontinued in October 2012. |
A change in brightness was noted for some EUVI 171 Angstrom images starting in 2011. This was determined to be due to a change in the required mechanism delay setting, which fixed the problem. However, the problem persisted on a few occasions when the delay setting was set to the old value:
In May 2024, Earth experienced some of the most intense geomagnetic storms seen in recent years. Solar eruptions that led to these storms were imaged by the SECCHI HI-2 camera on NASA STEREO-A. This image sequence shows the large CME front passing over Earth (far left, not to scale) along with concurrent Kp observations, which shows the Earth's geomagnetic response to the event.
Observations from the SECCHI HI-2 camera on May 12, 2024 (top), along with the concurrent "kp" geomagnetic activity index (lower). The location of Earth is as indicated on the left of the animation. [Credits: NASA/NRL/STEREO]
