TIMAS

Toroidal Imaging Mass-Angle Spectrograph (TIMAS) was one of several instruments on the POLAR spacecraft, and LASP provided management for TIMAS after September 2001. The science objectives of TIMAS were to investigate:

• The transfer of solar wind energy and momentum to the magnetosphere
• The interaction between the magnetosphere and the ionosphere
• The transport processes that distribute plasma and energy throughout the magnetosphere
• The interactions that occur as plasmas of different origins and histories mix and interact

In order to meet these objectives the TIMAS instrument measured virtually the full three-dimensional velocity distribution functions of all major magnetospheric ion species with one-half spin period time resolution.