Science Requirements

The main science questions which EST will address are:

• How does the magnetic field emerge to the surface and evolve?
• How is the energy transported from the photosphere to the chromosphere?
• How is the energy released and deposited in the upper atmosphere?
• Why does the Sun have a hot chromosphere?

The top-level science goals, as structured and described in the SRD, are :

I. Structure and evolution of magnetic flux

1. Formation and disappearance of kG flux concentrations in the solar photosphere
2. Magnetopauses and current sheets in the solar atmosphere
3. Small-scale flux emergence in the quiet Sun
4. Magnetic flux cancellations in the quiet Sun
5. Quiet Sun internetwork fields
6. Polar magnetic fields

II. Photospheric/chromospheric magnetic coupling

1. Magnetic topology of the photosphere and chromosphere
2. Conversion of mechancial to magnetic energy in the photosphere
3. Magnetic twist and torsion

III. Chromospheric structure, dynamics and heating

1. Wave propagation from photosphere to chromosphere
2. Energy dissipation in the chromosphere
3. Large-scale chromospheric release of magnetic energy
4. Observational determination of electric currents
5. Hanle diagnostics of chromospheric fields
6. The COmosphere

IV. Magnetized plasma processes

1. Dynamics of large-scale magnetic structures

V. The solar corona

VI. The explosive Sun

1. Solar flares and space weather

VII. Atomic physics

1. Spectro-polarimetric observations involving atomic physics phenomena

VIII. Non-solar astrophysics