Vortices in the solar photosphere

TL;DR

This paper uses numerical simulations and radiative diagnostics to analyze magnetic vortices in the solar photosphere, confirming their magnetic nature and exploring observational signatures, especially near the solar limb.

Contribution

It provides new insights into the magnetic nature of photospheric vortices and suggests observational methods to detect them using spectropolarimetry.

Findings

Most MHD Umov-Poynting flux is generated by horizontal vortex motions.

Photospheric vortices have a detectable signature in Stokes-V asymmetry near the solar limb.

Horizontal plasma motions are not detectable at disk center in spectropolarimetric data.

Abstract

Using numerical simulations of the magnetised solar photosphere and radiative diagnostics of the simulated photospheric models, we further analyse the physical nature of magnetic photospheric intergranular vortices. We confirm the magnetic nature of the vortices and find that most MHD Umov-Poynting flux is produced by horizontal vortex motions in the magnetised intergranular lanes. In addition, we consider possible ways to directly observe photospheric magnetic vortices using spectropolarimetry. Although horizontal plasma motions cannot be detected in the spectropolarimetric observations of solar disk centre, we find an observational signature of photospheric vortices in simulated observations of Stokes-V amplitude asymmetry close to the solar limb. Potential ways to find the vortices in the observations are discussed.