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The heliospheric magnetic field over the Hale cycle
The concept that open magnetic flux of the Sun (rooted with one and only one footpoint at the Sun) is a conserved quantity is taking root in the heliospheric community. Observations show that the Sun's open magnetic flux returns to the baseline from one solar minimum to the next. The temporary enhancement in the 1 AU heliospheric magnetic flux near solar maximum can be accounted for by the temporary creation of closed magnetic flux (with two footpoints at the Sun) during the ejection of coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which are more frequent near solar maximum. As a part of the International Heliophysical Year activities, this paper reviews two recently discussed consequences of open flux conservation: the reversal of open magnetic flux over the solar cycle driven by Coronal Mass Ejections and the impacts of open flux conservation on the global structure of the heliospheric magnetic field. These studies demonstrate the inherent linkages between coronal mass ejections, footpoint motions back at the Sun, and the global structure and evolution of the heliospheric magnetic field
The radial evolution of solar wind speeds
The WSA-ENLIL model predicts significant evolution of the solar wind speed. Along a flux tube the solar wind speed at 1.0 AU and beyond is found to be significantly altered from the solar wind speed in the outer corona at 0.1 AU, with most of the change occurring within a few tenths of an AU from the Sun. The evolution of the solar wind speed is most pronounced during solar minimum for solar wind with observed speeds at 1.0 AU between 400 and 500 km/s, while the fastest and slowest solar wind experiences little acceleration or deceleration. Solar wind ionic charge state observations made near 1.0 AU during solar minimum are found to be consistent with a large fraction of the intermediate-speed solar wind having been accelerated or decelerated from slower or faster speeds. This paper sets the groundwork for understanding the evolution of wind speed with distance, which is critical for interpreting the solar wind composition observations near Earth and throughout the inner heliosphere. We show from composition observations that the intermediate-speed solar wind (400-500 km/s) represents a mix of what was originally fast and slow solar wind, which implies a more bimodal solar wind in the corona than observed at 1.0 AU
Role of coronal mass ejections in the heliospheric Hale cycle
[1] The 11-year solar cycle variation in the heliospheric magnetic field strength can be explained by the temporary buildup of closed flux released by coronal mass ejections (CMEs). If this explanation is correct, and the total open magnetic flux is conserved, then the interplanetary-CME closed flux must eventually open via reconnection with open flux close to the Sun. In this case each CME will move the reconnected open flux by at least the CME footpoint separation distance. Since the polarity of CME footpoints tends to follow a pattern similar to the Hale cycle of sunspot polarity, repeated CME eruption and subsequent reconnection will naturally result in latitudinal transport of open solar flux. We demonstrate how this process can reverse the coronal and heliospheric fields, and we calculate that the amount of flux involved is sufficient to accomplish the reversal within the 11 years of the solar cycle
A possible generation mechanism for the IBEX ribbon from outside the heliosphere
The brightest and most surprising feature in the first all-sky maps of
Energetic Neutral Atoms (ENA) emissions (0.2-6 keV) produced by the
Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) is an almost circular ribbon of a
~140{\deg} opening angle, centered at (l,b) = (33{\deg}, 55{\deg}), covering
the part of the celestial sphere with the lowest column densities of the Local
Interstellar Cloud (LIC). We propose a novel interpretation of the IBEX results
based on the idea of ENA produced by charge-exchange between the neutral H
atoms at the nearby edge of the LIC and the hot protons of the Local Bubble
(LB). These ENAs can reach the Sun's vicinity because of very low column
density of the intervening LIC material. We show that a plane-parallel or
slightly curved interface layer of contact between the LIC H atoms (n_H = 0.2
cm^-3, T = 6000-7000 K) and the LB protons (n_p = 0.005 cm^-3, T ~ 10^6 K),
together with indirect contribution coming from multiply-scattered ENAs from
the LB, may be able to explain both the shape of the ribbon and the observed
intensities provided that the edge is < (500-2000) AU away, the LIC proton
density is (correspondingly) < (0.04-0.01) cm^-3, and the LB contains ~1% of
non-thermal protons over the IBEX energy range. If this model is correct, then
IBEX, for the first time, has imaged in ENAs a celestial object from beyond the
confines of the heliosphere and can directly diagnose the plasma conditions in
the LB.Comment: Accepted by Ap.J.Lett
The outer source of pickup ions and anomalous cosmic rays
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/95527/1/grl16222.pd
Statistical acceleration of interstellar pick‐up ions in co‐rotating interaction regions
Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/94615/1/grl9663.pd
Distance to the IBEX Ribbon Source Inferred from Parallax
Maps of Energetic Neutral Atom (ENA) fluxes obtained from Interstellar
Boundary Explorer (IBEX) observations revealed a bright structure extending
over the sky, subsequently dubbed the IBEX ribbon. The ribbon had not been
expected from the existing models and theories prior to IBEX, and a number of
mechanisms have since been proposed to explain the observations. In these
mechanisms, the observed ENAs emerge from source plasmas located at different
distances from the Sun. Since each part of the sky is observed by IBEX twice
during the year from opposite sides of the Sun, the apparent position of the
ribbon as observed in the sky is shifted due to parallax. To determine the
ribbon parallax, we found the precise location of the maximum signal of the
ribbon observed in each orbital arc. The obtained apparent positions were
subsequently corrected for the Compton-Getting effect, gravitational
deflection, and radiation pressure. Finally, we selected a part of the ribbon
where its position is similar between the IBEX energy passbands. We compared
the apparent positions obtained from the viewing locations on the opposite
sides of the Sun, and found that they are shifted by a parallax angle of
, which corresponds to a distance of
AU. This finding supports models of the ribbon with the source located just
outside the heliopause.Comment: 26 pages, 10 figures, 1 table, submitted to Ap
Scatter-free pickup ions beyond the heliopause as a model for the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) ribbon
We present new kinetic-gasdynamic model of the solar wind interaction with
the local interstellar medium. The model incorporates several processes
suggested by McComas et al. (2009) for the origin of the heliospheric ENA
ribbon -- the most prominent feature seen in the all sky maps of heliospheric
ENAs discovered by the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX). The ribbon is a
region of enhanced fluxes of ENAs crossing almost the entire sky. Soon after
the ribbon's discovery it was realized (McComas et al., 2009) that the
enhancement of the fluxes could be in the directions where the radial component
of the interstellar magnetic field around the heliopause is close to zero
(Schwadron et al., 2009). Our model includes secondary charge exchange of the
interstellar H atoms with the interstellar pickup protons outside the
heliopause and is a further advancement of the kinetic-gasdynamic model by
Malama et al. (2006) where pickup protons were treated as a separate kinetic
component. Izmodenov et al. (2009) have shown in the frame of Malama's model
that the interstellar pickup protons outside the heliopause maybe a significant
source of ENAs at energies above 1 keV. The difference between the current work
and that of Izmodenov et al. (2009) is in the assumption of no-scattering for
newly created pickup protons outside the heliopause. In this limit the model
produces a feature qualitatively similar to the ribbon observed by IBEX.Comment: submitted to ApJ
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