ACE SWICS: Solar Wind Ion Composition and Plasma Parameters, Hourly Data

ACE SWICS Version 1.1 data provides hourly measurements of solar wind ion composition, speeds, and charge states from before August 23, 2011. The dataset includes parameters like Fe/O abundance ratio, average charge states for C, O, Mg, Si, Fe, and a solar wind type classifier for streamer, coronal hole, or CME events. NASA produced this release with redesigned analysis methods to improve time series measurements and provide statistical error estimates.

Use Cases

• Classify solar wind types (streamer, coronal hole, CME) based on the provided solar wind type parameter.
• Model solar wind acceleration and heating processes based on ion speeds and thermal speeds.
• Study coronal mass ejection composition and evolution using elemental and charge state ratios.
• Analyze interstellar and interplanetary pick-up ion distribution functions up to 100 keV/e.

Strengths

• Data represents a major new update produced with completely redesigned analysis methods.
• Provides estimates of statistical error for the measurements.
• Rare elements are identified more reliably in this release.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is from the SWICS Version 1.1 instrument, which operated prior to August 23, 2011.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Measurements from the Solar Wind Ion Composition Spectrometer (SWICS) instrument on the ACE spacecraft.

Time Range

Data from before August 23, 2011.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03 13 04:33:57.849147; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Data collected in space at the L1 Lagrange point.