Predicting the energetic proton flux with a machine learning regression algorithm
This work addresses the need for real-time space weather hazard prediction, particularly for mission operations and planning, but it appears incremental as it adapts existing machine learning techniques to a specific domain challenge.
The paper tackles the problem of predicting solar proton events (SPEs) by developing a machine learning regression algorithm that forecasts energetic proton flux up to 1 hour ahead using only electron flux features, which could improve radiation risk monitoring in space environments.
The need of real-time of monitoring and alerting systems for Space Weather hazards has grown significantly in the last two decades. One of the most important challenge for space mission operations and planning is the prediction of solar proton events (SPEs). In this context, artificial intelligence and machine learning techniques have opened a new frontier, providing a new paradigm for statistical forecasting algorithms. The great majority of these models aim to predict the occurrence of a SPE, i.e., they are based on the classification approach. In this work we present a simple and efficient machine learning regression algorithm which is able to forecast the energetic proton flux up to 1 hour ahead by exploiting features derived from the electron flux only. This approach could be helpful to improve monitoring systems of the radiation risk in both deep space and near-Earth environments. The model is very relevant for mission operations and planning, especially when flare characteristics and source location are not available in real time, as at Mars distance.