Solar Orbiter hackathon

ESA/ESTEC, Noordwijk (Netherlands)

17-21 November 2025

Current news:

The meeting has now taken place. Thank you to all the participants and mentors for making this a great event!

Agenda 

Poster presentation of the hackathon presented at the ESA Science Faculty "Space Science Workshop"

Announcement: 

We are pleased to invite colleagues from across the solar and space science community to participate in a Solar Orbiter Hackathon, taking place between 17–21 November 2025 at ESA/ESTEC (Noordwijk, NL).

Since the start of the nominal mission phase at the end of 2021, the ESA/NASA Solar Orbiter mission has acquired invaluable datasets dedicated to the study of e.g. the Sun's atmosphere, transient events, and the solar wind. Thanks to the community at large, some of these datasets are augmented with data acquisition from other solar and space missions, as well as ground-based observatories. Since 18 February 2025, a Venus gravity-assist manoeuvre has brought the spacecraft into its high-latitude mission phase. The timing of this hackathon provides an opportunity to analyse these invaluable datasets.

This collaborative event is aimed at early career researchers (PhD and post-doctoral researchers), with the aim to bring together scientists with different skills to explore and analyse data from Solar Orbiter as well as other assets for which coordinated observations exist, tackling open questions in solar and heliospheric physics. 20 participants will be selected to work in 5 teams lead by mentors. Participants will have the opportunity to work with multi-instrument datasets, as well as develop and share analysis tools related to Solar Orbiter’s mission goals. Whether you are interested in solar imaging, in situ plasma data, or data-driven discovery, this is a great chance to connect, collaborate, and create.

Please note that the teams will be heavily relying on Python-based codes. However, proficiency in other programming languages, when beneficial to the teams, will be welcome. This should however be clearly stated in the application form.

Apply here: https://forms.cloud.microsoft/e/ucbTUuYGZv

Deadline to apply: 5th September

Fees: The hackathon is free to attend. However, participants are expected to have their travel covered (a travel fund is available for participants with limited funds).

We look forward to welcoming you at ESA!
Miho Janvier

Objectives

The Solar Orbiter mission is an M-class ESA mission from the COSMIC Vision Program, launched successfully on February 2020. Since the start of the nominal mission phase at the end of 2021, Solar Orbiter has acquired invaluable datasets dedicated to the study of e.g. the Sun's atmosphere, transient events, and the solar wind. Thanks to the community at large, some of these datasets are augmented with data acquisition from other solar and space missions, as well as ground-based observatories. Furthermore, on February 18th 2025, a Venus gravity-assist manoeuvre has brought the spacecraft into its high-latitude mission phase. 

The timing of this hackathon provides an opportunity to analyse these datasets, as well as to prepare the subsequent observations of the mission as the mission profile and the Sun's overall activity change.

Exploitation of the ESA Solar Orbiter mission will shape the activity of the international heliophysics community for the years to come. Its success will depend on our ability to combine in situ, remote sensing data from various sources, as well as engage the young scientific community.

Rationale

Solar Orbiter is a European Space Agency mission, launched in February 2020 and currently orbiting the Sun. Its mission is to solve the many mysteries of our star, from the origin of the solar wind that fills space, to the generation and variability of the solar magnetic field, and will address the central question of heliophysics: how does the Sun create and control the heliosphere?

The heliosphere is the domain of influence of the Sun and encompasses the space where the planets of the solar system can be found. Populated by particles and magnetic fields emanating from the Sun, it provides a medium where fundamental physical processes common to solar, astrophysical and laboratory plasmas can be investigated. The Sun's variability is expressed partly by the long-term solar activity cycle of about 11 years. Its understanding lies in how the magnetic field is generated and behaves in the inner layers of the Sun. On the other hand, the magnetic field evolves also on a shorter time scale, such as solar flares, which can send energetic particles and magnetized clouds in the interplanetary medium. These events may affect technologies used on Earth like the GPS. The Solar Orbiter mission, by scanning the Sun and the solar wind in its smallest details, will allow us to understand the variations of the heliosphere and their effects on the terrestrial environment.

The probe transports a series of ten remote-sensing and in situ instruments with the goal to bridge the gap between multi-wavelengths and magnetic observations of the Sun, its corona and the heliosphere, and direct measurements of the solar wind plasma, fields, waves and energetic particles (details of each instrument capability are given below in the list of tutorials). Because of the unique scientific capabilities this mission provides, and its unique vantage points (up to 0.28 AU in distance, and with orbits out of the ecliptic plane), we have made, and continue to expect to make major breakthroughs in understanding how the solar activity drives the inner solar system. 

The goal of the present hackathon, funded by the Science Faculty at ESA, is to invite young members of the solar and space communities to work together on complete datasets the mission and other assets will provide, and in using the numerous tools developed. This will allow them to combine the remote-sensing observations and the in situ measurements, and to use the numerical tools (e.g. magnetic field reconstruction, numerical simulations) developed internationally and that are fundamental in providing a scientific insight to the Solar Orbiter data.

We believe that such a hackathon will prove invaluable in augmenting the scientific return of the invaluable dataset collected so far, and a unique opportunity to explore the link between the Sun and the heliosphere.