The Swift Solar Activity X-ray Imager Instrument for the Hi-C Flare Campaign (SSAXI)

We propose to the NASA Low Cost Access to Space program to add the Swift Solar Activity X-ray Imager (SSAXI) Instrument as a ride-along to the already funded Hi-C Flare Campaign mission. The Flare Campaign is a high risk and high impact opportunity to observe a solar flare with multiple coordinated observatories including but not limited to: the Focusing Optics X-ray Solar Imager (FOXSI-4) rocket, the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST), Parker Solar Probe (PSP), and other current space observatories. The Hi-C Flare rocket will have a launch window spanning several hours a day, for several days at the Poker Flat Research Range (PFRR) in Alaska, until a large flare occurs for observation. The SSAXI instrument has peak sensitivity to 10 MK solar plasma, similar to the current Hi-C flare instruments and provides exploration of additional parameter space, including the variability in heating and energy transport of solar flares. SSAXI combines X-ray focusing optics and a high speed readout detector to image the flare soft X-rays at a high time cadence without image saturation and pixel signal blooming into adjacent pixels. This allows an unprecedented opportunity to image large flare hot plasma unobscured, with high contrast imaging. The SSAXI ride-along concept will provide the groundwork for a future instrument on large satellite missions. SSAXI will address portions of the NASA Heliophysics Science Goal 1 “Explore the physical processes at work in the space environment from the sun to Earth and throughout the solar system.” By investigation the science questions: SQ1: What is the relationship between soft X-ray pulsations and the continued heating into the decay phase? SQ2: How does the spatial and temporal evolution of soft X-ray pulsations constrain the heating and energy transport processes in flares? The SSAXI investigation will use numerical modeling, wavelet and Fourier analysis on the SSAXI data to constrain aspects of the flare heating and energy transport dynamics via the detected soft X-ray emission variability and quasi-periodic pulsations. The SSAXI investigation will train early career scientists, engineers, and students. The majority of the SSAXI science team are early career researches and there are plans for grad student and postdoc involvement on the SSAXI instrumentation team.

Enabling lower cost innovative remote sensing instrument development from concept through breadboard and demonstration

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