Models of force-free spheres and applications to solar active regions

TL;DR

This paper systematically studies axisymmetric force-free magnetic fields in spherical geometry, extending known solutions, calculating their energies and helicities, and proposing methods for fitting observed solar magnetic data.

Contribution

It extends non-linear force-free field solutions to a broader class using rational parameters and develops methods for fitting observed magnetograms.

Findings

Extended non-linear solutions to rational forms $n= p/q$.

Calculated energies and helicities for various configurations.

Proposed a method for fitting observed solar magnetic fields.

Abstract

Here we present a systematic study of force-free field equation for simple axisymmetric configurations in spherical geometry. The condition of separability of solutions in radial and angular variables leads to two classes of solutions: linear and non-linear force-free fields. We have studied these linear solutions Chandrasekhar (1956) and extended the non-linear solutions given in Low \& Lou (1990) to the irreducible rational form $n= p/q$, which is allowed for all cases of odd $p$ and to cases of $q>p$ for even $p$. We have further calculated their energies and relative helicities for magnetic field configurations in finite and infinite shell geometries. We demonstrate here a method here to be used to fit observed magnetograms as well as to provide good exact input fields for testing other numerical codes used in reconstruction on the non-linear force-free fields.