Pronouns: They/She

Position: PhD student (4th year)

Supervisor: Prof. Sandra Chapman

Funding: STFC

Additional Roles: CFSA Computing Helper; Module Feedback Coordinator

Background: BSc Physics, University of Aberdeen, 2021 (Machine Learning to Study Disordered Systems)

Project: Solar Wind Turbulence from In-Situ Observations with Solar Orbiter

The solar wind is a stream of energetic particles from the Sun, which for example causes the aurora when interacting with Earth’s magnetosphere. In extreme cases it can severely impact satellites for example, therefore it is included in the National Risk Register. The solar wind is a low-density plasma with high Reynolds number. As in any fluid-like medium, the solar wind exhibits turbulence, a non-linear phenomenon. Turbulence can be observable in for example smoke as swirls, also called eddies. As these swirls break up into smaller swirls which again break up into smaller ones and so on, the energy of one big swirl gets transferred into smaller swirls, which forms the turbulent cascade.

Solar Orbiter, a satellite by NASA and ESA launched in 2020, which is orbiting the sun and taking measurements from within the solar wind, provides us with an unprecedented opportunity to study turbulence. As Solar Orbiter is reaching into orbits closer to the sun than ever before, we can use the solar wind as large scale laboratory for plasma dynamics to study the characteristics of turbulence and its evolution with distance from the sun. We use observations from the Magnetometer (MAG) and the Solar Wind Analyser Suite (SWA) of homogeneous turbulence intervals.

This project studies two mechanisms which are proposed to mediate the energy cascade – coherent structures and waves. To distinguish these two we are modelling and adapting current data analysis methods to apply them to the in-situ measurements.

Publications

Bendt, A., Chapman, S., and Dudok de Wit, T. (2024) The relative prevalence of wave-packets and coherent structures in the inertial and kinetic ranges of turbulence as seen by Solar Orbiter, ApJ (doi)

Presentations

Meeting	Date	Type	Content	Doi
MIST Seminar	06/08/2024	Presentation	Talk
Dynamics Days 2024 Bremen	31/07/2024	Presentation
EGU	17/04/2024	Presentation		doi
Workshop on time-series analysis of noisy data	15/09/2023	Presentation & Poster
EGU	24/04/2023	Presentation		doi
Spring MIST	03/04/2023	Presentation	Spring MIST slides
CFSA Seminars	25/07/2022	Presentation
Solar Orbiter Summer School	02/06/2022	Poster

CFSA Computing Helper

CFSA Computing Quick Guide: computing guide

Contact details:

Email: alina.bendt@warwick.ac.uk

CFSA Computing: cfsacomputing@warwick.ac.uk

Office: Physical Sciences Building, PS1.17

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