We perform a number of numerical simulations of the solar corona with the aim to understand how it responds to different conditions in the photosphere. By changing parameters which govern the motion of the plasma at the photosphere we study the behavior of the corona, in particular, the effects on the current density generated. An MHD code is used to run simulations, using a 20x20x20 Mm^3 box with time spans ranging from one hundred to several hundreds of minutes. All the experiments show a fast initial increase of the current density, followed by a stabilization around an asymptotic value which depends on the photospheric conditions. These asymptotic average current densities as well as the turn-over points are discussed.
The Parker hypothesis (Parker (1972)) assumes that heating of coronal loops occurs due to reconnection, induced when photospheric motions braid field lines to the point of current sheet formation. In this contribution we address the question of how the nature of photospheric motions affects heating of braided coronal loops. We design a series of boundary drivers and quantify their properties in terms of complexity and helicity injection. We examine a series of long-duration full resistive MHD simulations in which a simulated coronal loop, consisting of initially uniform field lines, is subject…
We investigate the dynamics of a closed corona cartesian reduced magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model where photospheric vortices twist the coronal magnetic field lines. We consider two corotating or counter-rotating vortices localized at the center of the photospheric plate, and additionally more corotating vortices that fill the plate entirely. Our investigation is specifically devoted to study the fully nonlinear stage, after the linear stage during which the vortices create laminar and smoothly twisting flux tubes. Our main goal is to understand the dynamics of photospheric vortices twisting th…
We present a series of numerical simulations aimed at understanding the nature and origin of turbulence in coronal loops in the framework of the Parker model for coronal heating. A coronal loop is studied via reduced magnetohydrodynamics simulations in Cartesian geometry. A uniform and strong magnetic field threads the volume between the two photospheric planes, where a velocity field in the form of a 1D shear flow pattern is present. Initially the magnetic field which developes in the coronal loop is a simple map of the photospheric velocity field. This initial configuration is unstable to a …
We have performed MHD simulations of Alfven wave propagation along an open flux tube in the solar atmosphere. In our numerical model, Alfven waves are generated by the photospheric granular motion. As the wave generator, we used a derived temporal spectrum of the photospheric granular motion from G-band movies of Hinode/SOT. It is shown that the total energy flux at the corona becomes larger and the transition region height becomes higher in the case when we use the observed spectrum rather than white/pink noise spectrum as the wave generator. This difference can be explained by the Alfven wav…
The origin and evolution of the magnetic helicity in the solar corona are not well understood. For instance, the magnetic helicity of an active region is often about $10^{42}$ Mx$^2$ ($10^{26}$ Wb$^{2}$), but the observed processes whereby it is thought to be injected into the corona do not yet provide an accurate estimate of the resulting magnetic helicity budget or time evolution. The variation in magnetic helicity is important for understanding the physics of flares, coronal mass ejections, and their associated magnetic clouds. To shed light on this topic, we investigate here the changes in…
Within the coronae of stars, abundances of those elements with low first ionization potential (FIP) often differ from their photospheric values. The coronae of the Sun and solar-type stars mostly show enhancements of low- FIP elements (the FIP effect) while more active stars such as M-dwarfs have coronae generally characterized by the inverse-FIP effect (I-FIP). Here we observe patches of I-FIP effect solar plasma in AR 12673, a highly complex beta/gamma/delta active region. We argue that the umbrae of coalescing sunspots and more specifically strong light bridges within the umbrae, are prefer…
We study extreme-ultraviolet emission line spectra derived from three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamic models of structures in the corona. In order to investigate the effects of increased magnetic activity at photospheric levels in a numerical experiment, a much higher magnetic flux density is applied at photospheric levels as compared to the Sun. Thus, we can expect our results to highlight the differences between the Sun and more active, but still solar-like stars. We discuss signatures seen in extreme-ultraviolet emission lines synthesized from these models and compare them to signatures fou…
The energy released during solar flares is believed to be stored in non-potential magnetic fields associated with electric currents flowing in the corona. While no measurements of coronal electric currents are presently available, maps of photospheric electric currents can now be derived from SDO/HMI observations. Photospheric electric currents have been shown to be the tracers of the coronal electric currents. Particle acceleration can result from electric fields associated with coronal electric currents. We revisit here some aspects of the relationship between particle acceleration in solar …
Context: Many previous studies have shown that the magnetic precursor of a coronal mass ejection (CME) takes the form of a magnetic flux rope, and a subset of them have become known as `hot flux ropes' due to their emission signatures in $\sim$10 MK plasma. Aims: We seek to identify the processes by which these hot flux ropes form, with a view of developing our understanding of CMEs and thereby improving space weather forecasts. Methods: Extreme-ultraviolet observations were used to identify five pre-eruptive hot flux ropes in the solar corona and study how they evolved. Confined flares were o…
We present a new improved version of our force-free electrodynamics (FFE) numerical code in spherical coordinates that extrapolates the magnetic field in the inner solar corona from a photospheric vector magnetogram. The code satisfies the photospheric boundary condition and the condition divB=0 to machine accuracy. The performance of our method is evaluated with standard convergence parameters, and is found to be comparable to that of other nonlinear force-free extrapolations.
We investigate in more detail the origin of chromospheric Alfven waves that give rise to the separation of ions and neutrals, the First Ionization Potential Effect (FIP), through the action of the ponderomotive force. In open field regions, we model the dependence of fractionation on the plasma upflow velocity through the chromosphere for both shear (or planar) and torsional Alfven waves of photospheric origin. These differ mainly through their parametric coupling to slow mode waves. Shear Alfven waves appear to reproduce observed fractionations for a wider range of model parameters, and prese…
Context. Waves are ubiquitous in the solar corona and there are indications that they are excited by photospheric p-modes. However, it is unclear how p-modes in coronal loops are converted to sausage modes and transverse (kink) modes, which are observed in the corona. Aims. We aim to investigate how those wave modes are excited in the lower corona by photospheric acoustic waves. Methods. We built 3D magnetohydrostatic loop systems with multiple inclinations spanning from the photosphere to the lower corona. We then simulated these atmospheres with the MANCHA code, in which we perturb the equil…
Some models of coronal heating suppose that convective motions at the photosphere shuffle the footpoints of coronal magnetic fields and thereby inject sufficient magnetic energy upward to account for observed coronal and chromospheric energy losses in active regions. Using high-resolution observations of plage magnetic fields made with the Solar Optical Telescope aboard the Hinode satellite, we investigate this idea by estimating the upward transport of magnetic energy --- the vertical Poynting flux, S_z --- across the photosphere in a plage region. To do so, we combine: (i) estimates of photo…
In this paper we seek to understand the timescale on which the photospheric motions on the Sun braid coronal magnetic field lines. This is a crucial ingredient for determining the viability of the braiding mechanism for explaining the high temperatures observed in the corona. We study the topological complexity induced in the coronal magnetic field, primarily using plasma motions extracted from magneto-convection simulations. This topological complexity is quantified using the field line winding, finite time topological entropy and passive scalar mixing. With these measures we contrast mixing …
We present simulations modeling closed regions of the solar corona threaded by a strong magnetic field where localized photospheric vortical motions twist the coronal field lines. The linear and nonlinear dynamics are investigated in the reduced magnetohydrodynamic regime in Cartesian geometry. Initially the magnetic field lines get twisted and the system becomes unstable to the internal kink mode, confirming and extending previous results. As typical in this kind of investigations, where initial conditions implement smooth fields and flux-tubes, we have neglected fluctuations and the fields a…
We investigate the relation between characteristics of coronal mass ejections and parameterizations of the eruptive capability of solar active regions widely used in solar flare prediction schemes. These parameters, some of which are explored for the first time, are properties related to topological features, namely, magnetic polarity inversion lines (MPILs) that indicate large amounts of stored non-potential (i.e. free) magnetic energy. We utilize the Space Weather Database of Notifications, Knowledge, Information (DONKI) and the Large Angle and Spectrometric Coronograph (LASCO) databases to …
Where does solar flare energy come from? More specifically, assuming that the ultimate source of flare energy is mechanical energy in the convection zone, how is this translated into energy dissipated or stored in the corona? This question appears to have been given relatively little thought, as attention has been focussed predominantly on mechanisms for the rapid dissipation of coronal magnetic energy by way of MHD instabilities and plasma micro instabilities. We consider three types of flare theory: the steady state "photospheric dynamo" model in which flare power represents coronal dissipat…
Recent studies undoubtedly demonstrate that the magnetic field in the photosphere and corona is an intermittent structure, which offers new views on the underlying physics. In particular, such problems as the existence in the corona of localized areas with extremely strong resistivity (required to explain magnetic reconnection of all scales) and the interchange between small and large scales (required in study of the photosphere/corona coupling), to name a few, can be easily captured by the concept of intermittency. This study is focused on simultaneous time variations of intermittency propert…
For a better understanding of magnetic field in the solar corona and dynamic activities such as flares and coronal mass ejections, it is crucial to measure the time-evolving coronal field and accurately estimate the magnetic energy. Recently, a new modeling technique called the data-driven coronal field model, in which the time evolution of magnetic field is driven by a sequence of photospheric magnetic and velocity field maps, has been developed and revealed the dynamics of flare-productive active regions. Here we report on the first qualitative and quantitative assessment of different data-d…
We study the magnetic field evolution in the active region (AR) 12673 that produced the largest solar flare in the past decade on 2017 September 6. Fast flux emergence is one of the most prominent features of this AR. We calculate the magnetic helicity from photospheric tangential flows that shear and braid field lines (shear-helicity), and from normal flows that advect twisted magnetic flux into the corona (emergence-helicity), respectively. Our results show that the emergence-helicity accumulated in the corona is $-1.6\times10^{43}~Mx^2$ before the major eruption, while the shear-helicity ac…
The observed solar activity is believed to be driven by the dissipation of nonpotential magnetic energy injected into the corona by dynamic processes in the photosphere. The enormous range of scales involved in the interaction makes it difficult to track down the photospheric origin of each coronal dissipation event, especially in the presence of complex magnetic topologies. In this paper, we propose an ensemble-based approach for testing the photosphere - corona coupling in a quiet solar region as represented by intermittent activity in SOHO MDI and STEREO EUVI image sets. For properly adjust…
Back Reaction of the Untwisting Solar Corona Scars Sunspots
Sorbonne Université, Observatoire de Paris-PSL, École Polytechnique, IP Paris, CNRS（索邦大学，巴黎天文台-PSL，巴黎综合理工学院，巴黎理工学院，法国国家科学研究中心）；School of Astronomy and Space Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing, China（南京大学天文与空间科学学院）；Laboratoire de Physique des Plasmas, Paris, France（等离子体物理实验室）
Three extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) jets recurred in about one hour on 2010 September 17 in the following magnetic polarity of active region 11106. The EUV jets were observed by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) on board the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO). The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) on board SDO measured the vector magnetic field, from which we derive the magnetic flux evolution, the photospheric velocity field, and the vertical electric current evolution. The magnetic configuration before the jets is derived by the nonlinear force-free field (NLFFF) extrapolation. We derive…
One puzzling question in solar physics is the difference between elemental abundances in the photosphere and the corona. Elements with low first ionization potential (FIP) can be overabundant in the corona compared to the photosphere under certain circumstances. The same phenomenon has been observed on a handful of stars, while a few of them show the inverse effect. But not all the stars in the original sample had precise photospheric abundances derived from optical spectra, so for some the solar values were adopted. In this work we make homogeneous abundance measurements from optical spectros…
Observing the excitation mechanisms of incompressible transverse waves is vital for determining how energy propagates through the lower solar atmosphere. We aim to show the connection between convectively driven photospheric flows and incompressible chromospheric waves. The observations presented here show the propagation of incompressible motion through the quiet lower solar atmosphere, from the photosphere to the chromosphere. We determine photospheric flow vectors to search for signatures of vortex motion and compare results to {photospheric flows present in} convective simulations. Further…
In the context of coronal heating, among the zoo of MHD waves that exist in the solar atmosphere, Alfven waves receive special attention. Indeed, these waves constitute an attractive heating agent due to their ability to carry over the many different layers of the solar atmosphere sufficient energy to heat and maintain a corona. However, due to their incompressible nature these waves need a mechanism such as mode conversion (leading to shock heating), phase mixing, resonant absorption or turbulent cascade in order to heat the plasma. New observations with polarimetric, spectroscopic and imagin…
Simulating the photospheric to coronal plasma using magnetohydrodynamic characteristics III: validation including gravity, flux emergence, and an eruption
National Solar Observatory（国家太阳观测台）；NASA Goddard Space Flight Center（美国宇航局戈达德太空飞行中心）；U.S. Naval Research Laboratory（美国海军研究实验室）
We investigate the morphology and temporal variability of a quiet Sun network region in different solar layers. The emission in several EUV spectral lines through both raster and slot time series, recorded by EIS/Hinode is studied along with H$α$ observations and high resolution spectropolarimetric observations of the photospheric magnetic field. The photospheric magnetic field is extrapolated up to the corona showing a multitude of large and small scale structures. We show for the first time that the smallest magnetic structures both at the network and the internetwork contribute significantl…
We analyze several unusual filamentary structures, which appeared in the umbra of one of the sunspots in AR 11302. They do not resemble typical light bridges, neither in morphology, nor in evolution. We analyze data from SDO/HMI to investigate their temporal evolution, Hinode/SP for photospheric inversions, IBIS for chromospheric imaging, and SDO/AIA for the overlying corona. Photospheric inversions reveal a horizontal, inverse Evershed flow along these structures, which we call umbral filaments. Chromospheric images show brightenings and energy dissipation, while coronal images indicate that …
Two of the most widely observed and yet most puzzling features of the Sun's magnetic field are coronal loops that are smooth and laminar and prominences/filaments that are strongly sheared. These two features would seem to be quite unrelated in that the loops are near their minimum-energy current-free state, whereas filaments are regions of high magnetic stress and intense electric currents. We argue that, in fact, these two features are inextricably linked in that both are due to a single process: the injection of magnetic helicity into the corona by photospheric motions and the subsequent ev…
Solar filaments/prominences exhibit rotational motion during different phases of their evolution from their formation to eruption. We have observed the rotational/vortical motion in the photosphere near the ends of ten filaments during their initial phase of eruption, at the onset of the fast rise phase. All the filaments were associated with active regions. The photospheric vortical motions we observed lasted for 4--20 minutes. In the vicinity of the conjugate ends of the filament the direction of rotation was opposite, except for two cases, where rotational motion was observed at only one en…
Using spectropolarimetric data of an Active Region (AR) filament we have carried out inversions in order to infer vector magnetic fields in the photosphere (Si I line) and in the chromosphere (He I line). Our filament lies above the polarity inversion line (PIL) situated close to disk center and presents strong Zeeman-like signatures in both photospheric and chromospheric lines. Pore-like formations with both polarities are identified in the continuum under the PIL. The azimuth ambiguity is solved at both heights using the AZAM code. A comparison between the photospheric and chromospheric vect…
Coronal loops act as resonant cavities for low frequency fluctuations that are transmitted from the deeper layers of the solar atmosphere and are amplified in the corona, triggering nonlinear interactions. However trapping is not perfect, some energy leaks down to the chromosphere, thus limiting the turbulence development and the associated heating. We consider the combined effects of turbulence and leakage in determining the energy level and associated heating rate in models of coronal loops which include the chromosphere and transition region. We use a piece-wise constant model for the Alfve…
Flares produce sudden and permanent changes in the horizontal photospheric magnetic field. In particular flares generally produce increased magnetic shear in the photospheric field along the neutral line. Recent observations show also that flares can produce sudden photospheric motion. We present a model for the observed changes as the response of the photosphere to a large-amplitude shear Alfvén wave propagating down from the corona on either side of the neutral line. The Alfvénic front is assumed to impact the photosphere close to the neutral line first, and then successively further away wi…
The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager provides 45 s cadence intensity images and 720 s cadence vector magnetograms. These unprecedented high-cadence and high-resolution data give us a unique opportunity to study the change of photospheric flows and sunspot rotations associated with flares. By using the differential affine velocity estimator method and the Fourier local correlation tracking method separately, we calculate velocity and vorticity of photospheric flows in the flaring NOAA AR 11158, and investigate their temporal evolution around the X2.2 flare on 2011 February 15. It is found that …
On the basis of observations of solar granulation obtained with the New Solar Telescope (NST) of Big Bear Solar Observatory, we explored proper motion of bright points (BPs) in a quiet sun area, a coronal hole, and an active region plage. We automatically detected and traced bright points (BPs) and derived their mean-squared displacements as a function of time (starting from the appearance of each BP) for all available time intervals. In all three magnetic environments, we found the presence of a super-diffusion regime, which is the most pronounced inside the time interval of 10-300 seconds. S…
Vortex-type motions have been measured by tracking bright points in high-resolution observations of the solar photosphere. These small-scale motions are thought to be determinant in the evolution of magnetic footpoints and their interaction with plasma and therefore likely to play a role in heating the upper solar atmosphere by twisting magnetic flux tubes. We report the observation of magnetic concentrations being dragged towards the center of a convective vortex motion in the solar photosphere from high-resolution ground-based and space-borne data. We describe this event by analyzing a serie…
How much electromagnetic energy crosses the photosphere in evolving solar active regions? With the advent of high-cadence vector magnetic field observations, addressing this fundamental question has become tractable. In this paper, we apply the "PTD-Doppler-FLCT-Ideal" (PDFI) electric field inversion technique of Kazachenko et al. (2014) to a 6-day HMI/SDO vector magnetogram and Doppler velocity sequence, to find the electric field and Poynting flux evolution in active region NOAA 11158, which produced an X2.2 flare early on 2011 February 15. We find photospheric electric fields ranging up to …
A magnetohydrodynamic model that includes a complete electrical conductivity tensor is used to estimate conditions for photospherically driven, linear, non-plane Alfvenic oscillations extending from the photosphere to the lower corona to drive a chromospheric heating rate due to Pedersen current dissipation that is comparable to the net chromospheric net radiative loss of $\sim 10^7$ ergs-cm$^{-2}$-sec$^{-1}$. The heating rates due to electron current dissipation in the photosphere and corona are also computed. The wave amplitudes are computed self-consistently as functions of an inhomogeneous…
Using advanced numerical magneto-hydrodynamic simulations of the magnetised solar photosphere, including non-grey radiative transport and a non-ideal equation of state, we analyse plasma motions in photospheric magnetic vortices. We demonstrate that apparent vortex-like motions in photospheric magnetic field concentrations do not exhibit "tornado"-like behaviour or a "bath-tub" effect. While at each time instance the velocity field lines in the upper layers of the solar photosphere show swirls, the test particles moving with the time-dependent velocity field do not demonstrate such structures.…
Solar eruptive phenomena, like flares and coronal mass ejections(CMEs) are governed by magnetic fields. To describe the structure of these phenomena one needs information on the magnetic flux density and the electric current density vector components in three dimensions throughout the atmosphere. However, current spectro-polarimetric measurements typically limit the determination of the vector magnetic field only to the photosphere. Therefore, there is considerable interest in accurate modeling of the solar coronal magnetic field using photospheric vector magnetograms as boundary data. In this…
Solar filaments/prominences are one of the most common features in the corona, which may lead to energetic coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and flares when they erupt. Filaments are about one hundred times cooler and denser than the coronal material, and physical understanding of their material origin remains controversial. Two types of scenarios have been proposed: one argues that the filament plasma is brought into the corona from photosphere or chromosphere through a siphon or evaporation/injection process, while the other suggests that the material condenses from the surrounding coronal plasm…
Dynamical jets are generally found on Light bridges (LBs), which are key to studying sunspots decays. So far, their formation mechanism is not fully understood. In this paper, we used state-of-the-art observations from the Goode Solar Telescope, the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, the Spectro-Polarimeter on board Hinode and the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) on board the Solar Dynamics Observatory to analyze the fan shape jets on LBs in detail. Continuous upward motion of the jets in ascending phase is found from the H$α$ velocity, which lasts for 12 minutes and is associated with t…
We study the effect of photospheric footpoint motions on magnetic field structures containing magnetic nulls. The footpoint motions are prescribed on the photospheric boundary as a velocity field which entangles the magnetic field. We investigate the propagation of the injected energy, the conversion of energy, emergence of current layers and other consequences of the non-trivial magnetic field topology in this situation. These boundary motions lead initially to an increase in magnetic and kinetic energy. Following this, the energy input from the photosphere is partially dissipated and partial…
An analytical and numerical treatment is given of a constrained version of the tectonics model developed by Priest, Heyvaerts, & Title [2002]. We begin with an initial uniform magnetic field ${\bf B} = B_0 \hat{\bf z}$ that is line-tied at the surfaces $z = 0$ and $z = L$. This initial configuration is twisted by photospheric footpoint motion that is assumed to depend on only one coordinate ($x$) transverse to the initial magnetic field. The geometric constraints imposed by our assumption precludes the occurrence of reconnection and secondary instabilities, but enables us to follow for long ti…
It is well known that major solar eruptions are often produced by active regions with continual photospheric shearing and converging motions. Here, through high accuracy magnetohydrodynamics simulation, we show how solar eruption is initiated in a single bipolar configuration as driven by first shearing and then converging motions at the bottom surface. Different from many previous simulations, we applied the converging motion without magnetic diffusion, thus it only increases the magnetic gradient across the polarity inversion line but without magnetic flux cancellation. The converging motion…
The analysis of the photospheric velocity field is essential for understanding plasma turbulence in the solar surface, which may be responsible for driving processes such as magnetic reconnection, flares, wave propagation, particle acceleration, and coronal heating. Currently, the only available methods to estimate velocities at the solar photosphere transverse to an observer's line of sight infer flows from differences in image structure in successive observations. Due to data noise, algorithms such as local correlation tracking (LCT) may lead to a vector field with wide gaps where no velocit…
