U.S.-France Cooperative Research: Electric Currents in Complex Active Regions and Their Relation to Solar Flares and Prominences

该奖项将支持阿拉巴马大学亨茨维尔分校的 Marcos Machado 博士和法国巴黎默东天文台的 Brigitte Schmeider 博士之间的合作研究。 该项目的目标是研究复杂活动区域的电流及其与太阳耀斑和日珥的关系。 人们普遍认为，太阳耀斑是由于受压的载流磁场中储存的能量释放而引起的。 在过去的几年里，人们也清楚地意识到，复杂的场结构（表明受影响的磁双极之间可能存在相互作用）对于耀斑的触发以及日珥的形成及其喷发非常重要。 在耀斑产生的背景下，场的复杂性，特别是能量储存尚未完全被理解，但被认为与在光球层及以上观察到的会聚和剪切运动有关。 该项目将重点利用马歇尔太空飞行中心和默东天文台的数据以及色球层和日冕层场线连接的代理指标来检测电流的积累。 研究人员将利用美国和法国仪器的综合能力，强调电流的积累和速度场之间的联系。 为了实现这一目标，观测研究将与各种现场条件下的理论场计算相结合，以推断日冕场的拓扑结构及其对当前累积的响应。

This award will support collaborative research between Dr. Marcos Machado, University of Alabama in Huntsville, and Dr. Brigitte Schmeider, Observatory of Meudon, Paris, France. The objective of the project is to investigate electric currents in complex active regions and their relation to solar flare and prominences. It is widely accepted that solar flares are due to the release of energy stored in stressed, current carrying magnetic fields. Over the past few years, it has also become clear that complex field configuration, indicating the possible interaction between impacted magnetic bipoles, are important to the trigger of flares, as well as the formation of prominences and their eruption. Field complexity and particularly energy storage are not yet completely understood within the context of flare production, but are thought to be linked to converging and shearing motions observed at photospheric levels and above. This project will focus on the detection of current buildup, using data from the Marshall Space Flight Center and Meudon Observatory, as well as proxy indicators of field line connection in the chromo- sphere and coronal levels. The investigators will emphasize the link between current buildup and the velocity field, exploiting the combined capabilities of US and French instruments. In order to obtain this goal, the observational studies will be linked with theoretical field calculations under various field conditions to infer the topology of the coronal field and its response to the current buildup.