GOES-R Solar UltraViolet Imager Extended Coronal Imaging

GOES-16 and GOES-17 each hosts a Solar UltraViolet Imager (SUVI) that images the Sun in six extreme ultraviolet (EUV) wavelengths: 9.4 nm, 13.1nm, 17.1nm, 19.5nm, 28.4nm, and 30.4nm. The SUVI is nominally Sun-pointed and has a four-minute imaging sequence covering all the channels and meeting the dynamic range requirements. Based on the SUVI capabilities observed on-orbit, a campaign to image the extended solar corona was undertaken in 2018. This was performed by off-pointing the SUVI line-of-sight to the left and right of the Sun and producing a composite image by stitching together the off-pointed and the Sun-centered images. The imaging area in the composite is about three times the nominal image area in the East-West direction (about 5 RSun versus 1.8 RSun for nominal images). The campaign was conducted in February (4 hours), June (72 hours), and August-September of 2018 (5 weeks). Results from the campaign indicated the presence of solar corona to three solar radii, even in the quiet Sun part of the solar cycle. NOAA can operationalize this concept by tasking the SUVI on one of GOES-E and GOES-W. Such long-term operation will provide data that is needed to establish the much needed connectivity between the EUV and white light coronagraph data for the CME events.