Cluster II Data <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/>
 
This directory contains selected datasets for Cluster II mission downloaded from the Cluster Science Archive (CSA; <https://csa.esac.esa.int/csa-web/>) and from the UK Data Centre of the Cluster Science Data System (CSDS; <https://sci.esa.int/web/cluster/-/52770-csds>). The four almost identical Cluster spacecraft (1=Rumba, 2=Salsa, 3=Samba, 4=Tango) were launched in pairs on two Soyuz-Fregat vehicles by Starsem on 2000 July 16 and August 9 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome into elliptic polar orbits around Earth. The four satellites fly in a formation along orbits which take them between 19 000 and 119 000 kilometres from Earth. Sometimes, they will be inside the Earth's magnetic shield and sometimes they will be outside, fully exposed to the supersonic solar wind. During the mission, the distances between the spacecraft vary from a few hundred kilometers to several thousands of kilometers allowing studies of structures and processes both in small and large scales.

See CDAWeb <https://cdaweb.gsfc.nasa.gov> for plots and listings, with other access methods <https://cdaweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/alternative_access_methods.html>.  
 

Subdirectories:

    /IDFS/ Data from the Cluster II and DoubleStar missions stored at Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) under the Instrument Data File Set (IDFS) root directory. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/IDFS/README.txt>.

    /c1/ Data for instruments onboard the C1 spacecraft. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/c1/README.txt>

    /c2/ Data for instruments onboard the C2 spacecraft. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/c2/README.txt>

    /c3/ Data for instruments onboard the C3 spacecraft. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/c3/README.txt>

    /c4/ Data for instruments onboard the C4 spacecraft. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/c4/README.txt>

    /cl/ Cluster (reference spacecraft)

    /ct/ Centroid

    /documents/ User Guides (UGs) and Interface Control Documents (ICDs) for each eleven instruments.

    /merged/ The Sqlite3 database which contains electron plasma moments computed from data provided by CLUSTER PEACE and magnetic specta information from magnetic spectra computed from a combination of CLUSTER STAFF wideband and FGM full resolution vector data. See <https://spdf.gsfc.nasa.gov/pub/data/cluster/merged/upstream_burst_periods_gurgiolo/README.SQLITE>.


The Cluster Exchange Format (CEF) files have been converted into the Common Data Format (CDF) files following the ISTP/IACG guidelines. The file names are changed to all lower case and the start times and the end dates and times of the data period are removed from the file names upon ingestion to SPDF.

A full list of Cluster datasets are available from the Heliophysics Data Portal <https://heliophysicsdata.gsfc.nasa.gov/>.

The four Cluster II spacecraft were provided by the Prime Contractor Daimler Benz Aerospace (Dornier), Germany. The spacecraft were launched off the Baikonur Cosmodrome in 2000 July and August using the Russian Soyuz rockets under contract with Starsem, a European-Russian venture between Aerospatiale, Arianespace, the Russian Space Agency and Samara Space Center. The scientific instruments were built by European and American instrument teams led by Principal Investigators. Please acknowledge the instrument team (including the Principal Investigator) and NASA Space Physics Data Facility for making the data available.


Keywords: magnetospheric physics, space physics, solar wind, solar physics
 
Data contact: Pertti Makela <pertti.makela@nasa.gov>

Last updated on 2023 November 16