The motion of dark striations across bright filaments in a sunspot penumbra
has become an important new diagnostic of convective gas flows in penumbral
filaments. The nature of these striations has, however, remained unclear. Here
we present an analysis of small scale motions in penumbral filaments in both
simulations and observations. The simulations, when viewed from above, show
fine structure with dark lanes running outwards from the dark core of the
penumbral filaments. The dark lanes either occur preferentially on one side or
alternate between both sides of the filament. We identify this fine structure
with transverse (kink) oscillations of the filament, corresponding to a
sideways swaying of the filament. These oscillations have periods in the range
of 5-7 min and propagate outward and downward along the filament. Similar
features are found in observed G-band intensity time series of penumbral
filaments in a sunspot located near disk center obtained by the Broadband
Filter Imager (BFI) on board {\it Hinode}. We also find that some filaments
show dark striations moving to both sides of the filaments. Based on the
agreement between simulations and observations we conclude that the motions of
these striations are caused by transverse oscillations of the underlying bright
filaments.Comment: Accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal on 8th April 201
