We solve the problem of propagation and dissipation of Alfvénic turbulence in a model solar atmosphere consisting of a static photosphere and chromosphere, transition region, and open corona and solar wind, using a phenomenological model for the turbulent dissipation based on wave reflection. We show that most of the dissipation for a given wave-frequency spectrum occurs in the lower corona, an...

We have discovered small whirlpools in the Sun, with a size similar to the terrestrial hurricanes (. 0.5 Mm). The theory of solar convection predicts them, but they had remained elusive so far. The vortex flows are created at the downdrafts where the plasma returns to the solar interior after cooling down, and we detect them because some magnetic bright points (BPs) follow a logarithmic spiral ...

High resolution G-band images of the interior of a supergranulation cell show ubiquitous Bright Points (some 0.3 BPs per Mm2). They are located in intergranular lanes and often form chains of elongated blobs whose smallest dimension is at the resolution limit (135 km on the Sun). Most of them live for a few minutes, having peak intensities from 0.8 to 1.8 times the mean photospheric intensity. ...

Recently, we correlated the inferred structure of the solar chromospheric plasma topography with solar wind velocity and composition data measured at 1 AU. We now offer a physical justification of these relationships and present initial results of a empirical prediction model based on them. While still limited by the fundamentally complex physics behind the origins of the solar wind and how its...

We seek to clarify the nature of running penumbral (RP) waves: are they chromospheric trans-sunspot waves or a visual pattern of upward-propagating waves? Full Stokes spectropolarimetric time series of the photospheric Si i 10827 Å line and the chromospheric He i 10830 Å multiplet were inverted using a MilneEddington atmosphere. Spatial pixels were paired between the outer umbral/inner penumbra...

We analyze Fe I 630 nm observations of the quiet Sun at disk center taken with the spectropolarimeter of the Solar Optical Telescope aboard the Hinode satellite. A significant fraction of the scanned area, including granules, turns out to be covered by magnetic fields. We derive field strength and inclination probability density functions from a Milne-Eddington inversion of the observed Stokes ...

Assuming LTE, we synthesise solar G band spectra from the semiempirical flux-tube model of Briand & Solanki (1995). The results agree with observed G-band bright-point contrasts within the uncertainty set by the amount of scattered light. We find that it is the weakening of spectral lines within the flux tube that makes the bright-point contrast in the G band exceed the continuum contrast. We a...

The heating of the solar corona and the puzzle of the slender high reaching magnetic loops seen in observations from the Transition Region And Coronal Explorer(TRACE) has been investigated through 3D numerical simulations, and found to be caused by the well observed plasma flows in the photosphere displacing the footpoints of magnetic loops in a nearly potential configuration. It is found that ...

We present a new method of visualizing the solar photospheric magnetic field based on the “Magnetic Range of Influence” (MRoI). The MRoI is a simple realization of the magnetic environment in the photosphere, reflecting the distance required to balance the integrated magnetic field contained in any magnetogram pixel. It provides a new perspective on where sub-terrestrial field lines in a Potent...