Welcome !

Our group at the Department of Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering focuses on physics of the Sun-Earth interactions using ground-based and space-borne measurements together with global space weather simulations. Our research group collaborates with our local colleagues at the University of Michigan, but also interacts with leading groups in the US and elsewhere in the world. The links provide more information about auroras and space weather.

News:

  • 3/2024 Tuija Pulkkinen was cited in Washington Post in an article discussing the relationship of solar activity and energy consumption in Finland.
  • 1/2024 Qusai Al Shidi started as post-doc at West Virginia University. Congratulations Qusai!
  • 10/2023 Matti Ala-Lahti was promoted from Post-Doctoral Fellow to Assistant Research Scientist at the University of Michigan. Congratulations Matti!
  • 10/2023 Austin Brenner graduated after defending his thesis and continues as a postdoc in our group. Congratulations Dr. Brenner!

Selected publications

(students shown in bold-face, postdocs shown in italics)

2024

Q. Al Shidi, T. I. Pulkkinen, D. Welling, and G. Toth (2024), Accuracy of Global Geospace Simulations: How much of the error arises from solar wind input uncertainties?, Space Weather, in press, 2024.

Kumar, S., Pulkkinen, T. I., and  Gjerloev, J. (2024). Magnetotail variability during magnetospheric substorms. Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 129, e2023JA031722. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023JA031722.

2023

Akhavan-Tafti, M., Johnson, L., Sood, R., Slavin, J. A., Pulkkinen, T., Lepri, S., Kilpua, E., Fontaine, D., Szabo, A., Wilson, L., Le, G., Atilaw, T., Ala-Lahti, M., Soni, S. L., Biesecker, D., Jian, L., Lario Loyo, D (2023), Space Weather Investigation Frontier (SWIFT), Front. Astron. Space Sci. 10:1185603. doi: 10.3389/fspas.2023.1185603.

Akhavan-Tafti, T. Y. Atilaw, D. Fontaine, O. Le Contel, J. A. Slavin, T. Pulkkinen (2023), Magnetospheric Time History in Storm-Time Magnetic Flux Dynamics, J. Geophys. Res., Space Physics, 128, e2023JA031832. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023JA031832

Ala-Lahti, T. I. Pulkkinen, J. Ruohotie, M. Akhavan-Tafti, S. W. Good, and E. K. J. Kilpua (2023), Multipoint Observations of the Dynamics at an ICME Sheath–Ejecta Boundary, Ap. J., 956:131 (16pp), 2023. 10.3847/1538-4357/acf99e

A. Brenner, T. I. Pulkkinen, G. Toth, Q. Al Shidi (2023), Dissecting Earth’s Magnetosphere: 3D Energy Transport for a Real Storm Event, Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 128(11). doi:10.1029/2023JA031899.

Alexa J. Halford, Michael W. Liemohn, Christopher M. Bard, Astrid Maute, Ryan M. McGranaghan, Lynn B. Wilson III, Robert C. Allen, Chuanfei Dong, McArthur Jones Jr., Sarah K. Vines, Liang Wang, Tuija I. Pulkkinen (2023), Cultivating a culture of inclusivity in Heliophysics, Frontiers in Astronomy and Space Sciences, Vol 10, 2023. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspas.2023.1216449.

Minna Palmroth, Tuija I. Pulkkinen, Urs Ganse, YannPfau-Kempf, Tuomas Koskela, Markku Alho, Jonas- Suni, Giulia Cozzani, Ivan Zaitsev, Maxime Grandin, Lucile Turc, Markus Battarbee, Andreas Johlander, Maarja Bussov, Maxime Dubart, Harriet George, Evgeniy Gordeev, Konstantinos Horaites, Konstantinos Pa- padakis, Vertti Tarvus, Hongyang Zhou and Rumi Nakamura, Magnetotail eruption: Interplay of instabilities and reconnection, Nat. Geosci. 16, 570–576 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-023-01206-2

2022

Ala-Lahti, M., Pulkkinen, T. I., Pfau-Kempf, Y., Grandin, M., Palmroth, M. (2022). Energy flux through the magnetopause during flux transfer events in hybrid-Vlasov 2D simulations. Geophysical Research Letters, 49, e2022GL100079, 2022.

Al Shidi, Q., T. Pulkkinen, G. Toth, A. Brenner, S. Zou, J. Gjerloev (2022), A Large Simulation Set of Geomagnetic Storms — Can Simulations Predict Ground Magnetometer Station Observations of Magnetic Field Perturbations?, Space Weather, DOI: 10.1029/2022SW003049

Cohen, Christina M. S., Tuija I. Pulkkinen, Daniel N. Baker, Anthea J. Coster, Mary K. Hudson, Delores Knipp, KD Leka, Charles D. Norton, Terrance G. Onsager, Larry J. Paxton, Pete Riley, Ronald E. Turner, Nicholeen M. Viall-Kepko, Enaawoke Yizengav (2022),  Planning the Future Space Weather Operations and Research Infrastructure: Proceedings of the Phase II Workshop. The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/26712.

Cohen, C. M. S., T. Berger, M. I. Desai, N. Duncan, G. C. Ho, N. Maruyama, T. Pulkkinen, A. Szabo, A. Vourlidas, E. Zesta, Y. Zhang (2022), Living With a Star Mission Architecture. A vision for the future Living with a Star Program. NASA internal report.

Kallio, E., Jarvinen, R., Massetti, S., Alberti, T., Milillo, A., Orsini, S., E. De Angelis, G. Laky, J. Slavin, J. M. Raines, T. I. Pulkkinen (2022). Ultra-low frequency waves in the Hermean magnetosphere: On the role of the morphology of the magnetic field and the foreshock. Geophysical Research Letters, 49, e2022GL101850. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL101850.

Olli Knuuttila, Esa Kallio, Noora Partamies, Mikko Syrjasuo, Kirsti Kauristie, Vlktoria Sofieva, Ari-Matti Harri, Antti Kestila, Jarmo Kivekas, Petri Koskimaa, Petri Karha, Juba-Matti Lukkari, Tuija Pulkkinen, Jouni Ryno, Johanna Tamminen (2022), In-space Calibration of a Nanosatellite’s Camera, Journal of Small Satellites, Vol. 11, No. 3, pp. 1165–1186.

Pulkkinen, Tuija I., Austin Brenner, Qusai Al Shidi, and Gabor Toth (2022), Statistics of geomagnetic storms: Global simulations perspective. Front. Astron. Space Sci. 9:972150. doi: 10.3389/fspas.2022.972150.

Iong, Daniel, Yang Chen, Gabor Toth, Shasha Zou, Tuija Pulkkinen, Jiaen Ren, Enrico Camporeale, Tamas Gombosi (2022), New Findings From Explainable SYM-H Forecasting Using Gradient Boosting Machines, Space Weather, 20, e2021SW002928. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021SW002928

Jarvinen, R., E. Kallio and T. I. Pulkkinen (2022), Role of ultra-low frequency foreshock waves in ion dynamics at Mars, Journal of Geophysical Research: Space Physics, 127, e2021JA030078. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JA030078.