Speaker
Dr
Alessandro Bruno
(NASA/GSFC)
Description
The PAMELA mission has recently measured the fluxes of geomagnetically trapped protons with energy between 80 MeV and a few GeV at low Earth orbit (350-610 km). Data were analyzed in the frame of the adiabatic theory of charged particle motion in the geomagnetic field. Flux properties were investigated in detail, providing a full characterization of the proton radiation in the South Atlantic Anomaly region, including locations, energy spectra, and pitch angle distributions. PAMELA observations significantly improve the description of the Earth's radiation environment at low altitudes and high energies, placing important constraints on the trapping and interaction processes.
Primary authors
Dr
Alessandro Bruno
(NASA/GSFC)
Dr
Matteo Martucci
(INFN/Rome)
The PAMELA collaboration
