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Magnetosphere, Ionosphere and Solar-Terrestrial

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Call for applications for STFC Public Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum

 

The STFC Public Engagement Early-Career Researcher Forum (the ‘PEER Forum’) will support talented scientists and engineers in the early stages of their career to develop their public engagement and outreach goals, to ensure the next generation of STFC scientists and engineers continue to deliver the highest quality of purposeful, audience-driven public engagement.

Applications are being taken until 4pm on 3 June 2021. If you would like to apply, visit the PEER Forum website, and if you have queries This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The PEER Forum aims:

  • To foster peer learning and support between early career scientists and engineers with similar passion for public engagement and outreach, thus developing a peer support network that goes beyond an individual’s term in the forum 
  • To foster a better knowledge and understanding of the support mechanisms available from STFC and other organisations, including funding mechanisms, evaluation, and reporting. As well as how to successfully access and utilise this support 
  • To explore the realities of delivering and leading public engagement as an early career professional and build an evidence base to inform and influence STFC and by extension UKRI’s approaches to public engagement, giving an effective voice to early career researchers

What will participation in the Forum involve?

Participants in the PEER Forum will meet face-to-face at least twice per year to share learning and to participate in session that will strengthen the depth and breadth of their understanding of public engagement and outreach.

Who can apply to join the Forum?

The PEER Forum is for practising early-career scientists and engineers who have passion and ambition for carrying out excellent public engagement alongside, and complementary to, their career in science or engineering. We are seeking Forum members from across the breadth of STFC’s pure and applied science and technology remit.

The specific personal requirements of PEER Forum membership are that members:

  • Have completed (or currently studying for – including apprentices and PhD students) their highest level of academic qualification within the last ten years (not including any career breaks)
  • Are employed at a Higher Education Institute, or a research-intensive Public Sector Research Organisation or Research Laboratory (including STFC’s own national laboratories)
  • Work within a science and technology field in STFC’s remit, or with a strong inter-disciplinary connection to STFC’s remit, or use an STFC facility to enable their own research
  • Clearly describe their track record of experience in their field, corresponding to the length of their career to date
  • Clearly describe their track record of delivering and leading, or seeking the opportunity to lead, public engagement and/or outreach
  • Can provide insight into their experiences in public engagement and/or outreach and also evidence one or more of
  • Inspiring others
  • Delivering impact
  • Demonstrating creativity
  • Introducing transformative ideas and/or inventions
  • Building and sustaining collaborations/networks
  • Are keen communicators with a willingness to contribute to the success of a UK-wide network

    • https://stfc.ukri.org/public-engagement/training-and-support/peer-forum/  

    Astronet Science Vision & Infrastructure Roadmap

     

    Astronet is a consortium of European funding agencies, established for the purpose of providing advice on long-term planning and development of European Astronomy. Setup in 2005, its members include most of the major European astronomy nations, with associated links to the European Space Agency, the European Southern Observatory, SKA, and the European Astronomical Society, among others. The purpose of the Science Vision and Infrastructure Roadmap is to deliver a coordinated vision covering the entire breadth of astronomical research, from the origin and early development of the Universe to our own solar system.

    The first European Science Vision and Infrastructure Roadmap for Astronomy was created by Astronet, using EU funds, in 2008/09, and updated in 2014/15. Astronet is now developing a new Science Vision & Infrastructure Roadmap, in a single document with an outlook for the next 20 years. A delivery date to European funding agencies of mid-2021 is anticipated. 

    The Science Vision and Infrastructure Roadmap revolves around the research themes listed below:

    • Origin and evolution of the Universe
    • Formation and evolution of galaxies
    • Formation & evolution of stars
    • Formation & evolution of planetary systems
    • Understanding the solar system and conditions for life

    but will include cross-cutting aspects such as computing and training and sustainability.

     

    After some delays due to the global pandemic, the first drafts of the chapters for the document are now available from the Panels asked to draft them, for you to view and comment on. For the Science Vision & Roadmap to be truly representative it is essential we take account of the views of as much of the European astronomy and space science community as possible – so your input is really valued by the Panels and Astronet. Please leave any comments, feedback or questions on the site by 1 May 2021.

    It is intended that a virtual “town hall” style event will be held in late Spring 2021, where an update on the project and responses to the feedback will be provided.

    Equitable Letters in Space Physics (ELSP)

    Equitable Letters for Space Physics (ELSP) is a project to encourage merit-based recommendations and nominations in the space physics community by providing resources for letter writing and reviews of recommendation and nomination letters. You can learn more about ELSP's mission and find both letter writing and implicit bias resources at the ELSP website.

    ELSP seeks to achieve this goal by:

    1. Providing resources for people writing letters of recommendation and award nomination at the undergraduate level and above.
    2. Providing resources for people wishing to learn about different implicit biases and lessen their manifestation.
    3. Providing reviews of recommendation and nomination letters, with the goal of lessening implicit bias in these letters.

    At the moment, ELSP is seeking volunteers to participate as reviewers in the letter submission system. This system will function similarly to double-blind journal article reviews, with the ELSP executive director acting as editor.The ELSP board of directors is Angeline G. Burrell; John Coxon; Alexa Halford; McArthur Jones Jr.; and Kate Zawdie. If you have more questions or would like to participate, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

    Call for proposals for ESA's Living Planet Fellowship

    ESA is currently inviting proposals for their Living Planet Fellowship with a deadline of 15 March 2021. These fellowships, worth a maximum of €110k, are intended:

    To support young scientists, at post-doctoral level, to undertake cutting-edge research in Earth Observation, Earth System Science or Climate Research, maximising the scientific return of ESA and European EO missions and datasets through the development of novel EO methods, techniques and products, and by delivering excellent scientific results addressing the grand Earth Science challenges of the next decade, enabling improved predictions of the physical interaction of society with the Earth system.

    Interested candidates need to propose a two-year-long research plan which contributes to either of the two themes of the fellowship: "Advancing novel methods and techniques" or "Advancing Earth system science". The call also includes opportunities in the use of cloud computing capabilities; to support small ground-based experiments and in situ data collection; and a visiting scientist scheme to join the new ESA Earth System Science Hub.

    Questions related to the call can be submitted via email, and must be "not later than two weeks before the Closing Date" (i.e. by the end of February 2021). The timeline for the fellowships is as follows:

    Milestone Date
    Submission of proposals 15 March 2021 
    Communication of results* Q2 2021
    Beginning of activities* Q3 2021

    *tentative

    "Mental Health and Wellbeing in the MIST Community": A series of panel discussions

    We are hosting a series of pre-recorded panel discussions on the topic of "Mental Health and Wellbeing in the MIST Community", exploring the sources and impacts within our community as well as discussing ways to move forwards. The discussions will focus on both individual and community-wide perspectives, and will consider perspectives from a range of career stages. The panel discussions will separately focus on views from a) PhD students, b) PDRAs, and c) Tenure positions. 
     
    To ensure that the discussion focuses on the needs and issues most important to the MIST Community, we request your input on questions that you would like to pose to the panel, as well as specific topics that you would like to see covered. To suggest questions & topics, please use the following form: https://forms.gle/J4QS5JdaVCo1hF6z7 and submit your suggestions by Friday 26 February. Please note that any responses on the form are completely anonymous.
     
    For support with mental health and wellbeing concerns, we recommend the following resources: https://ras.ac.uk/education-and-careers/places-you-can-find-support.
     
    If you have any other questions, concerns, or would like to discuss anything in further detail, please get in touch at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

    Intense electric fields and electron-scale substructure within magnetotail flux ropes as revealed by the Magnetospheric Multiscale mission

    By Julia E. Stawarz, Department of Physics, Imperial College London, UK.

    In Stawarz et al. [2018], we examine large- and small-scale properties of three ion-scale flux ropes in Earth’s magnetotail. Evidence of variability in the flux rope orientations is found and an electron-scale vortex is discovered inside one of the flux ropes. 

    Magnetic reconnection, which releases stored magnetic energy and converts it into particle motion, is a key driver of dynamics in Earth’s magnetosphere. However, it is still not fully understood how particles are accelerated and energy is partitioned both within the reconnection diffusion region, where particles decouple from the magnetic field, and within reconnection outflows. Helical magnetic fields known as flux ropes are one type of structure generated by reconnection and often observed within reconnection outflows [Borg et al., 2012; Eastwood & Kiehas, 2015; Sharma et al., 2008], which are both theoretically [Drake et al., 2006; Dahlin et al., 2017] and observationally [Chen et al., 2008] linked with particle energization. Previous observations have shown flux ropes can have substructure and intense electric fields [e.g., Eastwood et al., 2007], but the nature of these electric fields have not been previously determined. Recent high-time-resolution, mutispacecraft measurements with electron-scale separations from NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) mission finally allow us to examine the detailed substructure of flux ropes.

    The three closely spaced flux ropes examined in Stawarz et al. [2018] are observed near a reconnection diffusion region and have different orientations, indicating significant spatiotemporal variability and highlighting the three-dimensional nature of the overall reconnection event. One of the most intense electric fields in the event is found within one of the flux ropes and is linked with an electron vortex (Fig. 1). The intense electric field is perpendicular to the magnetic field and the vortex consists of electrons that are frozen-in and ions that are decoupled from the fields. The resulting difference in motion between the ions and electrons drifting in the electromagnetic fields drives a current perpendicular to the magnetic field that produces a small-scale magnetic enhancement. The presence of such vortices may contribute to accelerating particles, either through inferred parallel electric fields at the ends of the structure or the excitation of waves, and points to the necessity of better understanding the substructure of flux ropes in order to characterize particle energization in magnetic reconnection.

    For more information, see our paper below:

    Stawarz, J. E., J. P. Eastwood, K. J. Genestreti, R. Nakamura, R. E. Ergun, D. Burgess, J. L. Burch, S. A. Fuselier, D. J. Gershman, B. L. Giles, O. Le Contel, P.-A. Lindqvist, C. T. Russell, & R. B. Torbert (2018), Intense electric fields and electron-scale substructure within magnetotail flux ropes as revealed by the Magnetospheric Multiscale mission, Geophys. Res. Lett., 45. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018GL079095

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    Figure 1: Overview of the electron vortex. (a) Electron-scale perturbation to the magnetic field with a 1s running average removed as observed by the four MMS spacecraft. (b,c) Components of the electric field perpendicular to the magnetic field as observed by the four MMS spacecraft. (d,e) Components of the current perpendicular to the magnetic field based on the curl of the magnetic field (black), moments of the ion and electron distribution functions (blue), and assuming the current is driven by electrons drifting in the electric and magnetic fields (red). (f)  Diagram of the electron vortex encountered inside of one of the flux ropes. The observed profiles of the electric field and current are consistent with the indicated trajectories through the structure.