Space Weather Laboratory
NASA/GSFC
David.g.sibeck at nasa.gov
Dr. Sibeck’s research focuses upon the interaction of the solar wind with the Earth’s magnetosphere and ionosphere, the regions where most space weather effects are felt. Following a post-doc working on AMPTE/CCE observations of the Earth’s radiation belts from 1985-1987, he advanced to a Principal Professional Staff position at JHU/APL. Here he became an AGU fellow, received the AGU’s Macelwane award, actively participated in the Czech, Russian, and Slovak Prognoz and Interball spacecraft programs (ultimately receiving a medal from Charles University in Prague for his services), led successful efforts to preserve and provide endangered NASA magnetospheric data sets, organized a series of competitively awarded research groups at Switzerland’s International Space Science Institute, and participated in a study to define the USAF’s space weather needs.
Upon moving to NASA/GSFC in 2002, he was almost immediately detailed to NASA/HQ, where he served a two-year term as Deputy Program Scientist setting up and running the Living With a Star (LWS) program, NASA’s preeminent space weather program. Since returning to NASA/GSFC in 2004, his work as Project and Mission Scientists has focused on the remarkably successful THEMIS/ARTEMIS and TRACERS Explorer and LWS Van Allen Probes missions. In recent years he has taken on the leadership of a cross-disciplinary group prototyping a wide field-of-view soft x-ray imager with applications for solar wind-magnetosphere and solar wind-planetary applications. Nevertheless, community service and research remain at the core of his interests. He is Past-President of the American Geophysical Union’s Space Physics and Aeronomy section. His most frequently cited first-authored papers concern the responses of the Earth’s dayside magnetosphere, ionosphere, and magnetotail to varying solar wind conditions. It has been his privilege to learn from and mentor a series of extraordinarily productive postdoctoral students.
Selected Relevant Publication:
Sibeck, D. G. and K. R. Murphy, Large-scale structure and dynamics of the magnetosphere, in Space Physics and Aeronomy Collection Volume 2: Magnetospheres in the Solar System, Geophysical Monograph 259, ed. R. Maggiolo, N. André, H. Hasegawa, and D. T. Welling, AGU, Washington, D. C., John Wiley and Sons, doi://10.1002/9781119815624.ch2, 2021.