Edwin Mierkiewicz
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Daytona Beach, FL·Earth & Environmental Science
Earth's atmosphere does not end abruptly. It fades into the exosphere, also called the geocorona, a huge cloud of hydrogen atoms stretching tens of thousands of kilometers into space.
- Fields
Earth & Environmental Science
Physics
Astronomy & Astrophysics
- Topics
geocorona
exosphere
thermosphere
- Grants
- 2 known grants, through May 2027
What they work on
- Measure hydrogen Balmer-alpha and Balmer-beta glow from ground observatories across the Americas, using Fabry–Perot interferometers and photometers, to fill nightside gaps left by NASA's Carruthers Geocorona Observatory.
- Combine ground measurements with Carruthers Lyman-alpha data to build a three-dimensional view of exospheric hydrogen density and its response to geomagnetic storms.
- Compare simultaneous hydrogen nightglow observations from Wisconsin (WHAM) and Chile (INSpIRe) to detect hemispheric differences in upper-atmosphere hydrogen.
- Compare decades of hydrogen observations with WACCM-X whole-atmosphere model simulations to explain hydrogen variability and its response to rising greenhouse gases.
More about the research
This hydrogen helps Earth recover from geomagnetic storms, which are solar-driven disturbances that can disrupt satellites, GPS and power grids. Its amount also reflects climate change lower in the atmosphere. The lab studies this hydrogen from the ground by measuring its faint glow with sensitive optical instruments. One project pairs these ground measurements with a new space mission, and the other tracks hydrogen over decades.
Why it matters
Better knowledge of Earth's hydrogen exosphere could improve space weather prediction. That would help protect satellites, GPS, power grids and astronauts during geomagnetic storms. Long-term hydrogen records also offer a way to detect greenhouse-gas-driven climate change in the upper atmosphere. They inform understanding of how planets lose their atmospheres.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Collaborative Research: RAPID: Time-Critical Ground-Based Observations of the Geocorona During the Primary Science Phase of the Carruthers Geocorona Observatory
NSF · Jun 2026 – May 2027
Collaborative Research: CEDAR--Upper Atmospheric Hydrogen Variability on Timescales from Dusk-Dawn to Multidecadal
NSF · Mar 2021 – Feb 2027
Closest labs
Xian Lu
Clemson University, SC·Physics
Determine the role of Alfvén waves in producing auroral arcs, compared with steady particle precipitation, using midnight short-wave infrared all-sky imaging combined with photometers, imagers and the PFISR radar at Poker Flat.
Brentha Thurairajah
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, VA·Earth & Environmental Science
Measure how much of the large-scale gravity wave activity in the thermosphere comes from the troposphere versus from sources above the stratosphere, using controlled SD-WACCM-X whole-atmosphere model simulations.
Yukitoshi Nishimura
Boston University, MA·Earth & Environmental Science
Determine how GPS position errors evolve during severe geomagnetic storms and how they relate to total electron content (TEC) structures in the ionosphere, using receiver data from the GAGE facility.
The school
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Daytona Beach: 5 labs on PI Pages, $35M a year on research, 27 research doctorates a year.
More about Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University-Daytona Beach
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