Marco Quadrelli
NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
There is a strong coupling mechanism between the lithosphere, ionosphere, magnetosphere, atmosphere, and the plasmasphere of many planetary bodies. For example, the ionosphere has been shown to respond to space weather events induced by Solar activity, as well as to atmospheric events, and events in the surface and interior of a planet. PULSAR (Planetary pULSe-tAkeR) is a stable spacecraft constellation that enables large and reconfigurable detector baselines to sense a wide range of frequencies in this coupled domain, and distributed spatial and temporal measurements on a global scale, leading to new planetary science measurements. Like a doctor taking vitals and monitoring the health state of a patient, PULSAR literally “takes the pulse of the planet”.
