Temporal Aspects of Solar Flares and Neupert Effect During October-November 2003

TL;DR

This study analyzes the temporal properties and Neupert effect of solar flares during October-November 2003, revealing how flare characteristics vary with class and the prevalence of Neupert effect deviations during the decay phase of solar cycle 23.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive statistical analysis of flare durations, asymmetries, and Neupert effect occurrence during a specific solar cycle phase, highlighting variations across flare classes.

Findings

H-alpha flare durations increase with class importance and brightness.

Neupert effect is observed in about 20% of events, with many showing deviations.

Asymmetry indices differ among H-alpha, SXR, and HXR flares.

Abstract

A statistical analysis of dataset of H-alpha, soft X-ray (SXR) and Hard X-ray (HXR) flares comprising almost 318, 401 and 1920 single events respectively that occurred during the period of October-November 2003 is presented. On the basis of this dataset, statistics on temporal properties e.g. duration, rise and decay times of H-alpha, SXR and HXR flare with regard to the flare classes is presented. The duration, rise and decay time for H-alpha flares increases with increasing importance and brightness classes. The increase is more pronounced for the duration and decay time. The same relation is valid with regard to the brightness class. On the other hand for SXR flares, the duration, rise and decay also increase with the flare class being more pronounced for the duration and rise time. We have also analysed the event asymmetry (EA) of H-alpha, SXR and HXR flares for the same period. The EA indices are predominantly positive for H-alpha but for SXR and HXR this shows symmetrical distribution on both sides of zero asymmetry. Our study also presents the result of the Neupert effect (NE) in solar flares for the same period. We investigate the time difference (\Delta t) between the maximum of SXR emission and the end of the HXR emission for many flares during the period of our investigation. Our study shows that distribution of the time difference reveals a peak at . Out of 236 events, only 48 (20.34 per cent) events satisfy the NE whereas there is also a significant fraction of flares 62 (26.27 per cent) which shows strong deviation form . The period of investigation is focused on the descending phase of solar cycle 23. Study of this period is significant because in this decay phase activity exhibits a sudden increase.