IRSOL researchers win two SNSF Spark grants

Science requires bravery. Bravery to explore paths that are still untrodden but also risky, because they could lead to a negative result. But that doesn't matter: this too is knowledge. In this context, the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) offers the Spark programme to fund original, innovative and unconventional ideas. Applications are reviewed using a double-blind process, ensuring that evaluation is based solely on scientific merits. Although the selection process is very strict and the probability of success is therefore very low, two researchers from the Istituto ricerche solari Aldo e Cele Daccò (IRSOL) have won funding from the Spark programme.

Dr. Gioele Janett proposed a method for measuring solar magnetic fields in the upper atmospheric layers using a particular spectral line of helium in the extreme ultraviolet, whose polarization signal has never been explored before. In fact, this spectral line could be particularly sensitive also to weak magnetic fields, but its sensibility has yet to be verified in the complex three-dimensional context of the solar atmosphere. If Dr. Janett's theoretical investigation yields positive results, the next step will be to design a sounding rocket experiment to carry out the measurements, in which researchers from both NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) have already expressed interest.

Dr. Fabio Riva's project is focussed at a lower level in the Sun's atmosphere: between the photosphere and the chromosphere. At the boundary between the two solar layers, there is a decoupling between the flows of charged and neutral particles, which therefore acquire different velocities. A single model to study both the photosphere and the chromosphere would be inadequate (too complex for the photosphere or too inaccurate for the chromosphere), so Dr. Riva's project proposes coupling two distinct numerical tools, CO5BOLD and MPI-AMRVAC, each optimised for the corresponding region. The aim is to improve our understanding of small-scale phenomena and the magnetic structure of the solar atmosphere.

To those who wonder what all this is for, there is only one answer: the Sun is the almost exclusive source of energy for life forms and human civilisation on Earth, and even a modest geomagnetic storm can cause major disasters. Knowing as precisely as possible the phenomena that our star can trigger is not only useful: it is vital.