Ming Zhang
Florida Institute of Technology
Solar energetic particles are high-energy radiation emitted from the sun during solar flares or coronal mass ejections. Once they are released from the sun, they travel through the magnetic fields of the solar corona and interplanetary medium. The radiation level at Earth can rise as soon as within eight minutes after events on the sun, but it may take hours to days to reach peak intensity and eventually subdue. The radiations are extremely harmful to astronauts working in space and electronic components on spacecraft, and airplane passengers on polar routes may also experience the radiation. To develop the software tools for forecasting solar energetic particle radiation, we apply machine learning to a large amount of observational and theoretical model data accumulated over the past several decades. The expected software will allow us to use real-time observations of solar corona mass ejections, solar flare x-ray, radio emissions, relativistic electrons, magnetic field, plasma, and other relevant measurements to forecast possible occurrence, timing and radiation level on the continuous-time bases.