THE GEOMAGNETIC FIELD UNDER THE HELIOSPHERIC FORCING. INFERRING EARTH INTERNAL STRUCTURE AND EVALUATING GEOPHYSICAL HAZARD OF SOLAR ERUPTIVE PHENOMENA

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The present project will have a twofold output at European and country scales, namely (1) improving models of magnetic and electrical structure of the underground; and (2) evaluating the geophysical hazards associated to the induced electric fields related to the heliosphere-magnetosphere interaction.

The new aspects and open problems to be tackled are:

- modeling the magnetic and electrical structure of the European lithosphere and mantle using geomagnetic variations at timescales of minutes-days provided by the network of European geomagnetic observatories;

- modeling the magnetic and electrical structure of the lithosphere and mantle for the Romanian territory based on new geomagnetic and magnetotelluric measurements taken with high performance equipment available at present on the market;

- assessing in a unitary way the geoeffectiveness of CMEs and HSSs in the time interval 1064-2011 and in the project interval 2011-2014;

- modeling the geoelectric field at the Earth’s surface at European and country scales, as produced by various magnetospheric and ionospheric current systems;

- evaluating the geophysical hazard associated to disturbed variations in the geomagnetic and geoelectric field during geomagnetic storms and substorms.

The project sets the grounds to effectively study GICs in future, in case of concrete electrical power, pipeline, and railway networks at European and country scales, study that will require a combined basic research and engineering effort.