Parker Solar Probe Observations of Suprathermal and Energetic Particles during Orbits 18 and 19
Creators
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1.
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
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2.
California Institute of Technology
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3.
Jet Propulsion Lab
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4.
Princeton University
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5.
Goddard Space Flight Center
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6.
University of New Hampshire
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7.
Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
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8.
University of California, Berkeley
Abstract
The Parker Solar Probe Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun (IS⊙IS) instrument suite measured a variety of suprathermal and energetic particle events during orbits 18 and 19. We provide an overview of key features of the observations to provide guidance critical to making progress on complicated, integrated data sets like those provided by IS⊙IS. In this work, we analyze and describe observations of particle acceleration signatures associated with coronal mass ejection (CME)–driven shocks and solar flares from 2023 November to 2024 March as measured by the IS⊙IS/Energetic Particle Instrument-Low Energy and Energetic Particle Instrument-High Energy particle detectors. We present energy spectra for protons through Fe ions from ∼10 keV nuc−1 to >10 MeV nuc−1, abundance ratios, and time series analyses for seven solar energetic particle (SEP) events with respect to the magnetic field and plasma context provided by the FIELDS and Solar Wind Electrons Alphas and Protons instruments, respectively. For SEP events in orbits 18 and 19, we find that acceleration driven by multiple CMEs in succession have larger variability in 4He/H and Fe/O ratios than singular CMEs, that flare-associated SEP events preferentially accelerate higher mass-to-charge ratio particles, and that shock upstream transients may be present in CME-driven interplanetary shocks.
Copyright and License
© 2025. The Author(s). Published by the American Astronomical Society. Original content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI.
Acknowledgement
The authors would like to thank the IS⊙IS and the PSP mission teams. G.D.B. and A.K. acknowledge financial support from the NASA PSP EPI-Lo contract NNN06AA01C. A.K. also acknowledges the support of NASA’s HGIO grant 80NSSC24K0555. The IS⊙IS data and visualization tools are available to the community at https://spacephysics.princeton.edu/missions-instruments/PSP. The EPI-Hi LET geometric factor corrections from S. Pak et al. (2025) and EPI-Lo ChanC 4He efficiency corrections used in this work will be available in future data releases. PSP was designed, built, and is operated by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory as part of NASA’s Living with a Star (LWS) program (contract NNN06AA01C). Solar Orbiter/STIX data are accessed through https://datacenter.stix.i4ds.net, GOES X-ray data through the Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) at https://services.swpc.noaa.gov/json/goes/primary/, and SOHO/LASCO data are retrieved from https://lasco-www.nrl.navy.mil/index.php?p=content/retrieve/products.
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Berland_2026_ApJ_996_11.pdf
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Additional details
Funding
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- NNN06AA01C
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- 80NSSC24K0555
Dates
- Submitted
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2025-10-02
- Accepted
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2025-11-02
- Available
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2025-12-22Published