2025-07-21 PUNCH Science Nugget
The solar wind is turbulent. One of PUNCH’s major objectives is to study that turbulent flow. However, obtaining quantitative
information about in-situ processes from our images can be challenging. PUNCH images integrate all light along the line of
sight between the observer and infinity, so the structure of local turbulence is blurred. We therefore expect its measurements
to relate differently from previous in-situ data to the underlying turbulent environment of the outer corona and inner heliosphere.
To understand these differences, we mimic the action of PUNCH observation itself (using the FORWARD tool,
Gibson+2016), processing
“ground truth” magnetohydrodynamic simulations of turbulence to obtain synthetic white-light (PUNCH-like) images. Direct 1-to-1
comparison of the simulation to “PUNCHified” images of the same shows how PUNCH observations change the spatial spectrum of the
turbulence. By simple integration (projection) of the simulated densities from 3D to 2D, we can match the PUNCH-specific variation
from the more sophisticated FORWARD model images. Compiling a catalog of simulations with different properties that match PUNCH
remote observations will be the key to determining the properties of the solar wind simultaneously across the vast PUNCH field of
view, yielding coverage impossible to attain with in-situ spacecraft alone. In preparation for these new observations, Associate
Investigator Francesco Pecora and colleagues have undertaken the forward analysis described above as
Paper 2 of the Solar Physics
PUNCH Mission Overview Topical Issue, providing context and guidance for PUNCH as it obtains its brand new view on solar wind
turbulence.