The Geospace Dynamics Constellation (GDC) mission: NASA's next Living With a Star mission to explore the Ionosphere/Thermosphere

Douglas E. Rowland1, Katherine Garcia-Sage2, Larry Kepko3, Rebecca L Bishop4, Yue Deng5, Jeffrey P Thayer6, Laila Andersson7, Mehdi Benna1, Daniel J Gershman8, Hassan Akbari1, Frederic Allegrini9, Levon A Avanov1, Daniel N Baker10, Jared Bell1, Stuart Bale11, Trevor Bowen12, James Burch13, Alex Chartier14, Mark Conde15, Anna D DeJong16,17, Scott England18, Robert Ergun19, Anders I Eriksson20, Christopher M Fowler21, Christine Gabrielse22, Kevin James Genestreti23, Tad Gielow24, Alex Glocer25, Katelynn Greer26, Ingemar Haggstrom27, Karine Issautier28, Jörg-Micha Jahn13, Mingwu Jin Sr29, George V Khazanov30, Jeffrey Klenzing8, David J Knudsen31, Burcu Kosar8,32, Yuni Lee1, Guiping Liu16, Greg Lucas33, David Malaspina34, Naomi Maruyama35, Robert Michell1, Sebastijan Mrak36, Keiichi Ogasawara13, Nikolaos Paschalidis37, Joshua Pettit38, Marcin Pilinski19, Antti A Pulkkinen30, Marc Pulupa39, Liying Qian40, Amy Catherine Rager8, Aaron J Ridley41, Robert M Robinson42, Marilia Samara8, Cheng Sheng5, Stanley C Solomon43, Thomas Sotirelis44, Eric K Sutton45, Xu Wang46, Daniel T. Welling47, Frederick D Wilder48, Simon Wing49, Arnaud Zaslavsky50, Eftyhia Zesta1 and Shunrong Zhang51, (1)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (2)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Community Coordinated Modeling Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (3)NASA GSFC, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (4)The Aerospace Corporation, Los Angeles, CA, United States, (5)University of Texas Arlington, Arlington, TX, United States, (6)University of Colorado at Boulder, Smead Aerospace Engineering Sciences, Boulder, United States, (7)Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, United States, (8)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, United States, (9)Southwest Research Institute San Antonio, San Antonio, TX, United States, (10)University of Colorado, Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, Boulder, CO, United States, (11)University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, United States, (12)University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, United States, (13)Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, TX, United States, (14)Applied Physics Laboratory Johns Hopkins, Laurel, United States, (15)University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK, United States, (16)Catholic University of America, Washington, United States, (17)Howard Community College, Columbia, United States, (18)Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Aerospace and Ocean Engineering, Blacksburg, VA, United States, (19)Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, Boulder, CO, United States, (20)IRF Swedish Institute of Space Physics Uppsala, Uppsala, Sweden, (21)West Virginia University, Physics and Astronomy, Morgantown, WV, United States, (22)The Aerospace Corporation, El Segundo, CA, United States, (23)Southwest Research Institute, Durham, United States, (24)Aerospace Corporation El Segundo, El Segundo, United States, (25)Rice University, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Houston, United States, (26)University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, United States, (27)European Incoherent Scatter Scientific Association, Kiruna, Sweden, (28)LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, Université PSL, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Université de Paris, Meudon, France, (29)University of Texas Arlington, Arlington, United States, (30)NASA/GSFC, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (31)University of Calgary, Calgary, AB, Canada, (32)The Catholic University of America, Washington, United States, (33)Univ of Colorado, Boulder, United States, (34)University of Colorado, Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences Department, Boulder, CO, United States, (35)University of Colorado, LASP, Boulder, United States, (36)University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, United States, (37)NASA/GSFC-Heliophysics Sci, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (38)George Mason University Fairfax, Fairfax, United States, (39)Space Sciences Laboratory, University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, United States, (40)National Center for Atmospheric Research, High Altitude Observatory, Boulder, United States, (41)Univ Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, United States, (42)NASA Goddard, Catholic University of America, Washington DC, DC, United States, (43)NCAR, HAO, Boulder, CO, United States, (44)Johns Hopkins Univ, Laurel, MD, United States, (45)University of Colorado at Boulder, Space Weather Technology, Research, and Education Center, Boulder, United States, (46)University of Colorado, Boulder, United States, (47)University of Michigan, Climate and Space Sciences and Engineering, Ann Arbor, United States, (48)University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, United States, (49)The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, MD, United States, (50)CNRS, Observatoire de Paris, LESIA, Meudon, France, (51)MIT Haystack Observatory, Westford, United States