Application of Measured Parameters to Large-Scale Numerical Modeling of Solar-Terrestrial Systems: An Overview

Models of the solar-terrestrial system traverse a range of physical regimes in which plasma and neutral components with diverse properties interact through different mechanisms. The causes, scale size, and persistence of spatial-temporal variations from average values vary dramatically across this system, as does the availability of measurement data for the physically important parameters. The objectives of numerical modeling of this system are similarly diverse. They include detailed retrospective modeling of events to advance basic scientific understanding, specification of the current environment, and forecasting of key quantities with lead times of hours to days.

For some components of the solar-terrestrial system, where future states depend strongly on the current system configuration, methods analogous to those developed for tropospheric applications may be of use. In other cases, where strongly driven systems respond rapidly to external stimuli with little dependence on the current state, measurement strategies may be better employed to quantify boundary conditions and improve model validity. In this paper, we attempt an overview of the various components of the solar-terrestrial system with regard to the importance, applicability, and feasibility of using measured quantities for obtaining or improving forecast capabilities.