NORSTAR photometers

The NORthern Solar Terrestrial ARray (NORSTAR) operates Meridian Scanning Photometers at 3 sites on the CGSM (formerly CANOPUS) Churchill Line. These sites are Pinawa, Gillam, and Rankin Inlet. This is the continuation of the CANOPUS MPA project. Note that the CANOPUS array included a fourth MSP at Fort Smith. That instrument has been decommissioned and is being used as a prototype for an upgrade of these aging instruments. The MSPs operate with spinning filter wheels and utilize eight interference filters. The signals for each of four scientific wavelengths as well as three background wavelengths are co-added in such a way that the data for all the wavelengths is collected simultaneously. The instruments are described in detail on the NORSTAR web site.

The MSPs provide one low-resolution (17 bin) meridian scan every minute. ASCII low-resolution data files in Rayleighs are available at the CSSDP. As well, IDL "save files" containing the low-resolution data are available from the NORSTAR web site, along with example IDL code to produce keograms like those provided in the standard NORSTAR summary plots. Higher resolution data (30 second cadence 80 latitude bin) is available on request from the PI.

Care must be taken in using the MSP data with regard to optical viewing conditions, as well as out-of-bandpass leakage of brighter discrete forms through the interference filters. Questions regarding the scientific use of the data should be directed to Eric Donovan, Brian Jackel, or Fokke Creutzberg ({eric,bjackel}@phys.ucalgary.ca; fcreutzb@NRCan.gc.ca). Questions regarding the instruments should be directed to Brian Jackel or Greg Baker ({bjackel,baker}@phys.ucalgary.ca).

Principal Investigator:	Dr. Eric Donovan
	eric@phys.ucalgary.ca