• Journal of Photoscience
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.170-173
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• 2002

Space is full of energetic events emitting high-energy radiations which may be fatal to all living things unless protected. The present paper briefly describes high-energy photons and particles incident on Earth surface and their common properties toward living things. Role of radiation played in evolution of life and earth environment will be presented.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.95.2-95.2
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• 2013

The Van Allen Probes were designed to study the Earth's radiation belts on various scales of space and time. The identical two spacecrafts going nearly eccentric orbits lap each other several times over the course of the mission and each probe carries five instrument suites to address the science objectives on the radiation belt. Since Van Allen Probes launched on August 30, 2012, the probes detecte several storm events up to now. To understand the particle acceleration and loss mechanism in the radiation belt, we first focus on the energetic electrons' dynamics detected by ECT (Energetic Particle, Composition, and Thermal Plasma Suite). ECT measures near-Earth space's radiation particles covering the full electron and ion spectra from ~ eV to 10's of MeV with sufficient energy resolution. In this paper, we present the preliminary results of the recent several storm events using electron data from ECT(MagEIS and REPT).

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.95.1-95.1
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• 2013

The RBSPICE (Radiation Belt Storm Probes Ion Composition Experiment) is one of five instrument suites onboard the twin Van Allan Probes (or Radiation Belt Storm Probes; RBSP), launched August 30, 2012 by NASA. One of science targets of RBSPICE instrument is to determine "how changes in that ring current affect the creation, acceleration, and loss of radiation belt particles?". For that purpose, it measures ions and electrons simultaneously. Ion's energy range is from ~20 keV to ~1 MeV and electron's energy channel is from ~35 keV to 1 MeV in order to provide supplementary information about the radiation belts. In this paper, we investigate a reliability of the electron flux measured from the RBSPICE by comparing with ECT (The Energetic Particle, Composition and Thermal Plasma Suite) data. We found there is a critical proton contamination problem in the electron channels of ~ 1MeV of RBSPICE observations during one moderate storm event of Sym H ~ -76 nT on March 1, 2013.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.94.1-94.1
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• 2013

Whistler mode chorus waves, which are observed outside the plasmasphere of the Earth's magnetosphere, play a major role in accelerating and scattering energetic electrons in the radiation belts. In this study we developed a predicting scheme of the global distribution of chorus by using the Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms (THEMIS) satellite data. First, we determined global spatial distributions of chorus activity, and identified fit functions that best represent chorus intensities in specific L-MLT zones. Second, we determined the specific dependence of average chorus intensity on preceding solar wind conditions (e.g., solar wind speed, IMF Bz, energy coupling degree) as well as preceding geomagnetic states (as represented by AE, for example). Finally, we combined these two results to develop the predicting functions for the global distribution and intensity of chorus. Implementing these results in the radiation belt models should improve the local acceleration effect by chorus waves.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.80-86
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• 1997

High energy particles in the earth's radiation belts cause transient and long term effects on electronic materials, devices, and integrated circuits on board the satellites. Hence, it is very important to have the information on the space radiation environment and the damage on the electronics caused by the se high energy particles. One of the radiation monitor devices frequently used in space is RADFET, a specially designed MOSFET with a thick gate oxide region. The present study focuses on the calibration of RADFET TOT500 using the $Co^{60}{\gamma}-ray$ source. The result shows that the response of RADFET is very sensitive to the change of temperature. The peculiar behavior observed in the TDE (Total Dose Experiment) on board the KITSAT-1 is identified as the thermal effect due to the change in the eclipse rate of the satellite.

• Progress in Medical Physics
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.30-38
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• 2004

Purpose: To develop a whole body frame for the purpose of reducing patient motion and minimizing setup error for extra-cranial stereotactic radiotherapy, and to evaluate the repositioning setup error of a patient in the frame. Materials and Methods: The developed whole body frame is composed of a base plate, immobilizer, vacuum cushion, ruler and belts. The dimension of the base plate is 130 cm in length, 50 cm in width and 1 cm in thickness. The material used in the base plate of the frame was bakelite and the immobilizer was made of acetal. In addition, Radiopaque angio-catheter wires were engraved on the base plate for a coordinate system to determine the target localization. The measurement for radiation transmission and target localization is peformed in order to test the utilization of the frame. Also, a Matlab program analyzed the patients setup error by using the patient's setup images obtained from a CCTV camera and digital record recorder (DVR). Results: A frame that is useful for CT simulation and radiation treatment was fabricated. The frame structure was designed to minimize collisions from the changes in the rotation angle of the gantry and to maximize the transmission rate of the Incident radiation at the lateral or posterior oblique direction. The lightening belts may be used for the further reduction of the patient motion, and the belts can be adjusted so that they are not in the way of beam direction. The radiation transmission rates of this frame were measured as 95% and 96% at 10 and 21 MV, respectively. The position of a test target on the skin of a volunteer is accurately determined by CT simulation using the coordinate system in the frame. The estimated setup errors by Matlab program are shown 3.69$\pm$1.60, 2.14$\pm$0.78 mm at the lateral and central chest, and 7.11 $\pm$2.10, 6.54$\pm$2.22 mm at lateral and central abdomen, respectively. The setup error due to the lateral motion of breast is shown as 6.33$\pm$ 1.55 mm. Conclusion: The development and test of a whole body frame has proven very useful and practical in the radiosurgery for extra-cranial cancers. It may be used in determining target localization, and it can be used as a patient immobilization tool. More experimental data should be obtained in order to improve and confirm the results of the patient setup error.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.31-38
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• 2021

In this paper, we present observations of the Space Radiation Detectors (SRDs) onboard the Next Generation Small Satellite-1 (NEXTSat-1) satellite. The SRDs, which are a part of the Instruments for the study of Stable/Storm-time Space (ISSS), consist of the Medium-Energy Particle Detector (MEPD) and the High-Energy Particle Detector (HEPD). The MEPD can detect electrons, ions, and neutrals with energies ranging from 20 to 400 keV, and the HEPD can detect electrons over an energy range from 0.35 to 2 MeV. In this paper, we report an event where particle flux enhancements due to substorm injections are clearly identified in the MEPD A observations at energies of tens of keV. Additionally, we report a specific example observation of the electron distributions over a wide energy range in which we identify electron spatial distributions with energies of tens to hundreds of keV from the MEPD and with energy ranging up to a few MeV from the HEPD in the slot region and outer radiation belts. In addition, for an ~1.5-year period, we confirm that the HEPD successfully observed the well-known outer radiation belt electron flux distributions and their variations in time and L shell in a way consistent with the geomagnetic disturbance levels. Last, we find that the inner edge of the outer radiation belt is mostly coincident with the plasmapause locations in L, somewhat more consistent at subrelativistic energies than at relativistic energies. Based on these example events, we conclude that the SRD observations are of reliable quality, so they are useful for understanding the dynamics of the inner magnetosphere, including substorms and radiation belt variations.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.49 no.12
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• pp.1019-1025
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• 2021

In nearly all space environments, the solar cell degradation is dominated by protons[1]. Even through a GEO orbit lines in the electron radiation belts, the protons emitted from any solar event will still dominate the degradation[1]. Since COMS launch on June 26 2010, the proton events with the fluence of more than approximately 30 times the average level of perennial observations were observed between January 23 - 29 2012 and March 07 - 14 2012[16]. This paper studies the solar cell degradation by solar proton events in January and March 2012 for the open circuit voltage(Voc) of a witness cell and the short circuit current(Isc) of a section connected to a shunt switch. To evaluate the performance of solar cell, the flight data of voltage and current are corrected to the temperature, the Earth-Sun distance and the Sun angle and then compare with the solar cell characteristics at BOL. The Voc voltage dropped about 23.6mV compare after the March 2012 proton events to before the January 2012 proton events. The Voc voltage dropped less than 1% at BOL, which is 2575mV. The Isc current decreased negligible, as expected, in the March 2012 proton events.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.303-309
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• 2014

The Earth's outer radiation belt often suffers from drastic changes in the electron fluxes. Since the electrons can be a potential threat to satellites, efforts have long been made to model and predict electron flux variations. In this paper, we describe a prediction model for the outer belt electrons that we have recently developed at Chungbuk National University. The model is based on a one-dimensional radial diffusion equation with observationally determined specifications of a few major ingredients in the following way. First, the boundary condition of the outer edge of the outer belt is specified by empirical functions that we determine using the THEMIS satellite observations of energetic electrons near the boundary. Second, the plasmapause locations are specified by empirical functions that we determine using the electron density data of THEMIS. Third, the model incorporates the local acceleration effect by chorus waves into the one-dimensional radial diffusion equation. We determine this chorus acceleration effect by first obtaining an empirical formula of chorus intensity as a function of drift shell parameter $L^*$, incorporating it as a source term in the one-dimensional diffusion equation, and lastly calibrating the term to best agree with observations of a certain interval. We present a comparison of the model run results with and without the chorus acceleration effect, demonstrating that the chorus effect has been incorporated into the model to a reasonable degree.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.247-253
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• 2013

It has long been known that the magnetospheric particles can precipitate into the atmosphere of the Earth. In this paper we examine such precipitation of energetic electrons using the data obtained from low-altitude polar orbiting satellite observations. We analyze the precipitating electron flux data for many periods selected from a total of 84 storm events identified for 2001-2012. The analysis includes the dependence of precipitation on the Kp index and the electron energy, for which we use three energies E1 > 30 keV, E2 > 100 keV, E3 > 300 keV. We find that the precipitation is best correlated with Kp after a time delay of < 3 hours. Most importantly, the correlation with Kp is notably tighter for lower energy than for higher energy in the sense that the lower energy precipitation flux increases more rapidly with Kp than does the higher energy precipitation flux. Based on this we suggest that the Kp index reflects excitation of a wave that is responsible for scattering of preferably lower energy electrons. The role of waves of other types should become increasingly important for higher energy, for which we suggest to rely on other indicators than Kp if one can identify such an indicator.