The High-Energy Particle Detector (HEPD-01) as a space weather monitoring instrument on board the CSES-01 satellite

CSES-01 (China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite) is the first element of an extended constellation of LEO (Low Earth Orbit) satellites, dedicated to monitoring perturbations of electromagnetic fields, plasma and charged particle fluxes induced by natural sources and artificial emitters in the near-Earth space. One of the nine payloads on board CSES-01 is the Italian High-Energy Particle Detector (HEPD-01), which is equipped with a silicon tracker and a range calorimeter to detect electrons (3-100 MeV), protons (30-250 MeV), and light nuclei. Since the launch of CSES-01 in February 2018, HEPD-01 has already returned valuable information about variations in the Earth-Sun interaction during geomagnetic-storm transients. One of such events was the G3-class geomagnetic storm that impacted the Earth’s magnetosphere in late August 2018, causing a temporary rearrangement of the charged particle environment around the planet. In this work, the HEPD-01 response to this magnetospheric disturbance is presented on the base of particle rate variation measurements. The study of such events is crucial to better understand mechanisms taking place during solar events and to prevent their harmful effects on technological and anthropic systems, as well as on human health. The presented results confirm the HEPD-01 capabilities in monitoring the near-Earth environment and contributing to establish a nowcasting/forecasting network in the nearest possible future.