Solar Maximum Mission Coronagraph-Polarimeter Coronal Images
The Solar Maximum Mission (SMM) Coronagraph / Polarimeter (C/P) was launched on the SMM spacecraft on February 14, 1980. It operated in low Earth orbit from March 2, 1980 to September 23, 1980. The spacecraft attitude control system failed in November 1980, resulting in a cessation of SMM C/P data until the spacecraft was repaired by astronauts on the Challenger space shuttle (STS-41C) in April 1984. SMM C/P resumed data acquisition on April 26, 1984 and operated until Nov 17, 1989 when its orbit decayed and it reentered Earth’s atmosphere on December 2, 1989. The orbital period of the SMM spacecraft was approximately 95 minutes with ~45 minutes of occultation. SMM C/P acquired images of the solar corona from 1.8 to 4.1 solar radii over a full 360 degree field-of-view and out to 6 solar radii over the lower latitude regions. SMM C/P recorded the total coronal brightness (F + K corona) and linear polarization using a variety of filters: blue filter: 448.1 nm (ctr.) ; width of filter = 32.5 nm green filter: 517.1 nm (ctr.) ; width of filter = 31.4 nm red filter: 620.0 nm (ctr.) ; width of filter = 43.6 nm wideband filter: 478.5 nm (ctr); width of filter = 67.3 nm halpha emission line; 656.4 nm (ctr); width of filter = 4.2 nm green line (FeXIV) : 530.3 nm (ctr); width of filter = 0.55 nm green continuum: 529.7 nm (ctr); width of filter = 0.55 nm The bulk of the data were acquired using the green filter and the halpha filter. SMM C/P images are 448 x 448 pixels with a pixel size is 6.4 arcsec with a spatial resolution of ~12 arcsec. Coronal images were acquired in sectors around the Sun (north, east, south, west, ne, nw, se, sw) so that 4 sector images were needed to construct a full 360 degree view of the corona. Images were acquired every ~90 seconds until late 1986 when a tape recorder failure resulted in a temporal resolution of 8 minutes. Images are available in FITS format and are fully calibrated intensity in units of 1.e-11 B/Bsun, where Bsun is the brightness of the solar disk. The stray light radiance noise level is ~5.e-10 B/Bsun. Data are also available with vignetting in the images to provide higher contrast for tracking coronal structures such as CMEs, however, these images should not be used to compute calibrated brightness, density or mass.
dataset
Image
publication
2017-07-17
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Corona
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Coronal Holes
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Coronal Mass Ejections
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Solar Active Regions
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Solar Imagery
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Solar Prominences/Solar Filaments
Earth science > Sun-Earth Interactions > Solar Activity > Solar Synoptic Maps
Solar/Space Observing Instruments > Photon/Optical Detectors > Coronagraphs
Space > Solar Region > Corona
publication
2005-11-17
1980-03-02
1989-11-17
publication
1980
The user is granted the right to use Solar Maximum Mission C/P observations for non-commercial, non-profit research, or educational purposes only, without any fee or cost. The user is responsible to meet the Terms of Use and Copyright Issues furnished on the UCAR web site. Please credit all use of Mauna Loa data as: 'Courtesy NASA and the High Altitude Observatory, National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR).' (See also https://www.ucar.edu/terms-of-use )
Access Constraints: Free access
pointOfContact
pointOfContact
2026-04-24T11:28:00.322914