Superhot (> 30 MK) flare observations with STIX: Joint spectral fitting

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that joint spectral fitting of different STIX detectors effectively diagnoses both hot and superhot plasma components in large solar flares, enhancing understanding of flare thermal structures.

Contribution

The paper introduces a novel joint spectral fitting method using STIX detectors with different attenuation schemes to analyze multithermal flare plasma.

Findings

Superhot component often dominates above 15 keV during peak times.

Two thermal components better fit the HXR spectra of large flares than a single isothermal model.

Joint fitting reveals up to 10% superhot contribution in GOES long-wavelength channels.

Abstract

Spectroscopic analysis of large flares (>X1) in the hard X-ray (HXR) range offers unique insights into the hottest (> 30 MK) flare plasma, the so-called superhot thermal component. To manage the high count rates in large flares, an attenuator is typically placed in front of the HXR detectors. However, this significantly limits the spectral diagnostic capabilities at lower energies, and consequently, it restricts the analysis of the lower temperatures in flares. The Spectrometer/Telescope for Imaging X-rays (STIX) on board the Solar Orbiter mission was designed to observe solar flares in hard X-rays. The imaging detectors use an attenuator during periods of high flux level. In contrast, the background (BKG) detector of STIX is never covered by the attenuator and is therefore dedicated to measure the unattenuated flux using differently sized apertures placed in front of the detector. We aim to demonstrate that joint spectral fitting using different detector configurations of STIX allows us to reliably diagnose both the hot and the superhot components in large flares. We jointly fit the HXR spectra of the STIX BKG detector and the STIX imaging detectors using SUNKIT-SPEX software package to determine the spectral parameters of both the hot and superhot thermal components in solar flares. Using joint fitting on 32 STIX flares, we corroborate that for GOES X-class flares, the HXR spectrum is better represented by two thermal components instead of an isothermal component. At the temperature peak time, the superhot HXR flux above 15 keV is typically stronger than the hot HXR flux. The GOES long-wavelength channel is dominated by the hot component with a superhot contribution up to 10%. This paper demonstrates that joint spectral fitting of the same detector type with different attenuation schemes is a simple and powerful method to monitor multithermal flare plasma.