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MMS 3 Digital Signal Processor (DSP) Search Coil Magnetometer (SCM), Magnetic Field Power Spectral Density, Level 2 (L2), Fast Mode, 2 s Data

Metadata Updated: September 19, 2025

The MMS magnetic field power spectral density (BPSD) is computed onboard by the Digital Signal Processor (DSP). The fast Fourier transform (FFT) calculation is performed on a digitized version of analog signals from the Search Coil Magnetometer (SCM) in the SCM123 coordinate system, see SCM data product guide for details, https://lasp.colorado.edu/mms/sdc/public/datasets/fields/. This data product is computed in space from individual components that are not synchronized to the 1 second pulse. Therefore, the timing between channels can be inaccurate by a fraction of a second. The samples times are interval start times taken from the x component. The spectra are calculated via a 1024-point FFT algorithm on piecewise continuous sets of waveform data. Nine signals can be processed simultaneously. Six of the twelve DC-coupled E, DC-coupled V, or SCM signals (16384 samples/s) are selected for spectral processing at 100% duty cycle. In addition, the three AC-coupled signals (262,144 kS/s) each can be processed at 6.25% duty cycle. Each of the nine signals has 16, 1024-point FFT operations every second; the field-programmable gate array (FPGA) performs 144 FFTs per second. The FFT is performed by an arithmetic logic unit (ALU), which is controlled by a state machine. Both are hard-coded into the FPGA. The operation starts by applying a 1024-point Hanning window onto a waveform. Next, an FFT is implemented. The FFT is broken into a series of "butterfly" operations performed by the ALU. The result has real and imaginary data. Power spectra are calculated by taking the sum of squares of real and imaginary values (the ALU includes a multiplier), which produces a power spectrum with 512 frequency bins. The frequency bins are then combined to give pseudo-logarithmic frequency spacing (del f)/f. The spectra are reduced to 88 frequency bins with (del f)/f between 6% and 12% when possible. Narrow-band emissions can be fit to an accuracy of (del f)/f ~3%, allowing for an accurate determination of plasma density. The spectra can be averaged in time. The fastest reporting rate of any signal is 16 spectra per second. Reporting rates can be as slow a one spectra every 16 s (averaging 256 spectra). The DSP and SCM instrument papers can be found at https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11214-014-0115-x and https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11214-014-0096-9, respectively. The DSP and SCM data product guides can be found at https://lasp.colorado.edu/mms/sdc/public/datasets/fields/.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date August 21, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 19, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from NASA Data.json

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date August 21, 2025
Metadata Updated Date September 19, 2025
Publisher MMS Science Data Center;NASA Space Physics Data Facility (SPDF) Coordinated Data Analysis Web (CDAWeb) Data Services
Maintainer
Identifier https://doi.org/10.48322/6shs-d833
Data Last Modified 2025-09-10
Category Heliophysics
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 026:00
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id a236d5f8-ab23-4f0d-9503-53e99513156d
Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
Homepage URL https://doi.org/10.48322/6shs-d833
Program Code 026:000
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 63c53b331159d653f8e1cba408ec2d4e9d3b8c3e60756099bf6a1e9fd53a113c
Source Schema Version 1.1
Temporal 2015-03-17/2015-03-17

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