The physics of Coronal Mass Ejections through novel Extreme Ultraviolet Imager observations and modeling

The Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) onboard Solar Orbiter (SolO) is providing novel and unprecedented observations of the solar corona and chromosphere, revealing us the details on the coronal structures not seen up to now. These observations are crucial for improving our understanding of the structure and dynamics of the sun's atmosphere. The main scientific objective of this PhD project is to study and characterize Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) and advance our knowledge on their relationship with the interplanetary counterparts (ICMEs). For that purpose, I will employ observations by the instruments onboard SolO and Parker Solar Probe (PSP). I will combine these novel observations with the EUHFORIA (EUropean Heliospheric FORecasting Information Asset) state-of-the-art heliospheric 3D MHD model of the solar wind and CMEs, with the aim to obtain a novel insight into the internal structure and properties of CMEs and ICMEs. In particular I aim to employ state-of-the-art CME models, such as FRiED 3D, which require information from the EUV (extreme ultraviolet) coronal source region of the CME that will be provided by the EUI observations. I will develop and validate the tools to convert the observational information to input parameters for the advanced CME models. At the same time I will also address some of the still open questions related to the propagation of the magnetic CMEs in the realistic solar wind environment.