Self-organization of solar magnetic fields

TL;DR

This paper investigates the self-organization of solar magnetic fields, revealing a thin, powerful solar dynamo that influences solar phenomena and magnetic field reversals, supported by analysis of torsional oscillations and magnetograms.

Contribution

It demonstrates that the solar dynamo is thin, powerful, and responsible for various solar magnetic phenomena, providing a new understanding of the solar magnetic cycle and field reversals.

Findings

The solar dynamo is thin (~0.1 Mm) and powerful (~10^23 W).

Torsional oscillations correlate with the solar cycle and support the dynamo model.

The magnetic field reverses approximately every 11 years due to magnetic structure loss.

Abstract

Self-organization properties of sustained magnetized plasma are applied to selected solar data to understand solar magnetic fields. Torsional oscillations are speed-up and slow-down bands of the azimuthal flow that correlate with the solar cycle, and they imply the existence of a symmetric solar dynamo with a measured polar flux of 3x10^14 Wb. It is shown that the solar dynamo is thin (~0.1 Mm gradient scale size) and powerful (~10^23 W). These properties are found from the amplitude of the torsional oscillations and the relationship of their velocity contours to solar magnetograms supports the result. The dynamo has enough power to heat the chromosphere and to power the corona and the solar wind. The dynamo also causes a rigid rotation of the heliosphere out to at least the corona and the relationship of the rotation of the corona to solar magnetograms supports this result as well. The thin solar dynamo sustains a thin stable minimum energy state that seems to be covering most of the solar surface just below the photosphere. The magnetic field lines of the minimum energy state should be parallel to the solar surface and rotate with distance from the surface with 2{\pi} radians of rotation in ~1 Mm Resistive diffusion helps to push the magnetic fields to the surface and the global magnetic structure (GMS) seems to lose {\pi} radians every 11 years, causing the observed 180 degree flipping of the solar magnetic field. The thin sheets of magnetized plasma in solar prominences may be the lost thin sheets of the GMS. For completeness, the formation of sunspots, CMEs and flares is discussed.