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LYRA calibrated data are available on-line

Since March 10, both LYRA and SWAP provide calibrated data in near-real time. Previously, it was only the case for SWAP, LYRA was only delivering its uncalibrated data, labeled as “level1” products. The calibration process applied to reach “level 2”, involves the correction of dark current and of filter degradation, and converts the data into irradiance units (W/m2).

SWAP observes spectacular eruption

Peaking at 07:35 on February 24, a flare happened at the solar North-East limb. The flare was of category M3.5, noteworthy in itself, but the associated eruption was truly remarkable with plasma being ejected and trackable all the way till the edge of the SWAP field of view. See the SWAP movies!

PROBA2 sees first X-flare

On February 15, around 2am, SWAP and LYRA registered their first X-flare. The active region labelled NOAA AR 1158, and located close to the centre of the solar disk, produced an X2.2 flare peaking at 01:56 UT. It was associated with an Earth directed CME, which is expected to arrive at Earth on Feb 17. The flare was observed at 50ms cadence in the four LYRA bandpasses, showing the high energy burst in the Aluminium and Zirconium channels.

SWAP monthly movies

Starting in December 2010, SWAP movies are made for a complete month. The image cadence is 1 hour and blurred images are removed. The movie will be made in the first week of each month and will appear in the folder proba2.sidc.be/swap/data/mpg/movies/YYYY/MM/.

Enjoy the movies of December 2010 and January 2011.

PROBA2 observes a double eclipse

On January 4, SWAP and LYRA observed the partial solar eclipse.

PROBA2 mission extension

Good news! On November 18, the ESA Science Programme Committee has approved the extension of PROBA2 operations until the end of 2012. SWAP and LYRA data will be scientifically exploited for at least one year longer than originally planned. This gives the science team at ROB an extra boost to proof the science excellence of these 2 instruments in the following years. Read more in the ESA article online.

PROBA2 eclipse season 2010 has started

The eclipse season has started for PROBA2, although not in all channels/instruments yet. Every winter, the solar (E/X)UV signals SWAP and LYRA observe are obscured by the Earth and Earth’s atmosphere. Earlier this week, we saw the first effects of the filtering by the Earth’s atmosphere in the two short-wavelength LYRA channels: Al and Zr. The long wavelength channels, neither SWAP show any effect yet but this will come very soon, later this week.

SWAP Bake-out campaign

From October 12 10:30 till October 13 10:30 SWAP was in a so-called bake-out campaign with the telescope detector heated to 50C. In previous months, the sensitivity of the detector was slowly degrading (in the order of few %) . With the current bake-out campaign we attempt to reverse this degradation. The detector heating can possibly evaporate condensation from the detector or annihilate radiation induced crystal defects in the silicon of the detector. Future analysis will reveal if the bake-out campaign indeed has a positive effect.

Four eclipses in one day

On July 11, 2010, a total solar eclipse took place which on Earth could only be seen from the South Pacific Ocean and Easter Island. From the dawn-dusk orbit in which PROBA2 resides, the totality could not be seen, but the spacecraft did cross the lunar shadow path four times. As a result, SWAP and LYRA registered four partial eclipses in five hours time. Enjoy the spectacle in the SWAP movie below.

PROBA2 workshop at ESA/ESTEC

On June 22, 2010, a PROBA2 workshop took place at ESA/ESTEC to review the status of the spacecraft, onboard technology demonstrators and instruments after 8 months in space.

Several colleagues of the PROBA2 Science Center participated and presented SWAP, LYRA and the Science Center located at the Royal Observatory in Belgium.

This event attracted the following press attention:

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