Cross Helicity and the Helium Abundance as an in situ Metric of Solar Wind Acceleration

TL;DR

This study analyzes 28 years of Wind spacecraft data to explore how helium abundance and Alfvénicity can serve as in situ metrics for understanding different solar wind acceleration mechanisms and source regions.

Contribution

It introduces a novel categorization scheme based on helium abundance and cross helicity, revealing insights into the origins and acceleration of Alfvénic slow wind.

Findings

Alfvénic slow wind shares properties with fast wind despite slow speeds.

Maximum speeds from intermittently open regions exceed minimum speeds from continuously open regions.

Helium abundance and Alfvénicity effectively distinguish solar wind source regions.

Abstract

The two-state solar wind paradigm is based on observations showing that slow and fast solar wind have distinct properties like helium abundances, kinetic signatures, elemental composition, and charge-state ratios. Nominally, the fast wind originates from solar sources that are continuously magnetically open to the heliosphere like coronal holes while the slow wind is from solar sources that are only intermittently open to the heliosphere like helmet streamers and pseudostreamers. The Alfv\'enic slow wind is an emerging 3rd class of solar wind that challenges the two-state fast/slow paradigm. It has slow wind speeds but is highly Alfv\'enic, i.e. has a high correlation between velocity and magnetic field fluctuations along with low compressibility typical of Alfv\'en waves, which is typically observed in fast wind. Its other properties are also more similar to the fast than slow wind. From 28 years of Wind observations at 1 AU, we derive the solar wind helium abundance ($A_\mathrm{He}$), Alfv\'enicity ($\left|\sigma_c\right|$), and solar wind speed ($v_\mathrm{sw}$). Characterizing vsw as a function of $\left|\sigma_c\right|$ and $A_\mathrm{He}$, we show that the maximum solar wind speed for plasma accelerated in source regions that are intermittently open is faster than the minimum solar wind speed for plasma accelerated in continuously open regions. We infer that the Alfv\'enic slow wind is likely solar wind originating from open-field regions with speeds below the maximum solar wind speed for plasma from intermittently open regions. We then discuss possible implications for solar wind acceleration. Finally, we utilize the combination of helium abundance and normalized cross helicity to present a novel solar wind categorization scheme that illustrates the transition in observations of solar wind at 1 AU from magnetically closed to magnetically open sources.