Touching the Sun to protect the Earth: A Q&A with Justin Kasper on going where no probe has gone before
From the The Michigan Engineer News Center: Justin Kasper, professor of climate and space sciences and engineering at the University of Michigan, is a mission principal investigator on the Parker Solar Probe, which is scheduled for launch Aug. 11 from Cape Canaveral, Fla.
鈥淭he Parker Solar Probe will help us do a much better job of predicting when a disturbance in the solar wind could hit Earth,鈥 Kasper said.
Kasper describes the data that the new probe will collect as a 鈥淩osetta Stone鈥 for theories about the physics behind coronal mass ejections鈥攄ramatic explosions that can hurl massive clouds of the sun鈥檚 plasma at Earth. In the worst case, scientists worry that a severe solar storm could wipe out the electric grid for months or years in some parts of the planet. But if better prediction software gives us an early warning, electricity providers can protect the grid and prevent major outages.