The Fast Plasma Investigation (FPI) was developed for flight on the Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission to measure the differential directional flux of magnetospheric electrons and ions with unprecedented time resolution to resolve kinetic-scale plasma dynamics. This increased resolution has been accomplished by placing four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for electrons and four dual 180-degree top hat spectrometers for ions around the periphery of each of four MMS spacecraft. Using electrostatic fieldof-view deflection, the eight spectrometers for each species together provide 4pi-sr field-ofview with, at worst, 11.25-degree sample spacing. Energy/charge sampling is provided by swept electrostatic energy/charge selection over the range from 10 eV/q to 30000 eV/q. The eight dual spectrometers on each spacecraft are controlled and interrogated by a single block redundant Instrument Data Processing Unit, which in turn interfaces to the observatory's Instrument Suite Central Instrument Data Processor. This paper describes the design of FPI, its ground and in-flight calibration, its operational concept, and its data products.
[1] A new data mode and new analysis methods are used to detect Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs) with the Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) 10 times more frequently than previously. In 1037 h of observations at times and over regions for which TGFs are expected, 384 new TGFs were found in addition to the 39 TGFs and two Terrestrial Electron Beam events already detected without the new data mode and methodology. Cosmic ray showers were found to be an important background; they show characteristic signatures in the data of both GBM and the Fermi Large Area Telescope Calorimeter that enable their removal, leaving a sample estimated to consist of 98% TGFs. The sample includes shorter TGFs than previously found with GBM. The true duration distribution likely contains additional short TGFs because their detection by GBM is limited by detector dead time. One-third of this sample has matches with locations from the World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN)-maps of these locations show the geographic and meteorological features more clearly than maps of spacecraft locations. The intrinsic TGF rate is evaluated using the lightning rate maps of the Lightning Imaging Sensor, accounting for the detection efficiency of GBM as a function of spacecraft-source offset, from which we estimate a global TGF rate of 400,000 per year. With continuous production of data in the new mode we estimate that GBM will detect 850 TGFs per year.
[1] Using the detected energy per strokes of the World Wide Lightning Location Network (WWLLN) we calculate the relative detection efficiency for the network as if it had a uniform detection efficiency. The model uses the energy statistics of located strokes to determine which stations are sensitive to what stroke energies. We are then able to estimate the number of strokes that may be missing from any given regions as compared to the best, most sensitive regions of the WWLLN network. Stroke density maps can be corrected with the knowledge of how sensitive various regions of the network are operating. This new model for the relative WWLLN detection efficiency compensates for the uneven global coverage of the network sensors as well as variations in very low frequency (VLF) propagation. The model gives a way to represent the global distribution of strokes as if observed by a globally uniform network. The model results are analyzed in spatial and temporal regimes, and the effects of a single VLF detector going offline are investigated in areas of sparse and dense detector coverage. The results are also used to show spatial, temporal and energy distributions as seen by the detection efficiency corrected WWLLN.
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