Quiet-Sun hydrogen Lyman-alpha line profile derived from SOHO/SUMER solar-disk observations

TL;DR

This paper derives a reference quiet-Sun hydrogen Lyman-alpha spectral profile from SOHO/SUMER observations, providing a tool for radiative transfer modeling of solar and heliospheric structures, and analyzes how solar cycle variations affect synthetic spectra.

Contribution

It introduces a method to adapt Lyman-alpha profiles to specific dates and assesses their impact on radiative transfer models of solar phenomena.

Findings

Synthetic spectra are strongly affected by incident radiation changes.

Hydrogen H alpha line can be significantly influenced by solar cycle variations.

The derived profile serves as a boundary condition for modeling solar chromospheric and coronal structures.

Abstract

The solar radiation in the Lyman-alpha spectral line of hydrogen plays a significant role in the illumination of chromospheric and coronal structures, such as prominences, spicules, chromospheric fibrils, cores of coronal mass ejections, and solar wind. Moreover, it is important for the investigation of the heliosphere, Earth's ionosphere, and the atmospheres of planets, moons, and comets. We derive a reference quiet-Sun Lyman-alpha spectral profile that is representative of the Lyman-alpha radiation from the solar disk during a minimum of solar activity. This profile can serve as an incident radiation boundary condition for the radiative transfer modelling of chromospheric and coronal structures. Because the solar radiation in the Lyman lines is not constant over time but varies significantly with the solar cycle, we provide a method for the adaptation of the incident radiation Lyman line profiles (Lyman-alpha and higher lines) to a specific date. Moreover, we analyse how the change in the incident radiation influences the synthetic spectra produced by the radiative transfer modelling. To take into account the Lyman-alpha variation with the solar cycle, we used the LISIRD composite Lyman-alpha$ index. To estimate the influence of the change in the incident radiation in the Lyman lines on the results of radiative transfer models, we used a 2D prominence fine structure model. The analysis of the influence of the change in the incident radiation shows that the synthetic spectra are strongly affected by the modification of the incident radiation boundary condition. The hydrogen H alpha line can also be considerably affected, despite the fact that the H alpha radiation from the solar disk does not vary with the solar cycle.