Slow magnetoacoustic waves in coronal loops: EIT and TRACE

¹ Centre for Plasma Astrophysics, K.U. Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200B, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
² Royal Observatory of Belgium, Ringlaan 3, 1180 Brussel, Belgium
³ Physics Department, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK

Corresponding author: E. Verwichte, Erwin.VERWICHTE@oma.be

Received: 20 November 2000
Accepted: 6 February 2001

Abstract

On May 13, 1998 the EIT (Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope) on board of SoHO (Solar and Heliospheric Observatory) and TRACE (Transition Region And Coronal Explorer) instruments produced simultaneous high cadence image sequences of the same active region (AR 8218). TRACE achieved a 25 s cadence in the Feix (171 Å) bandpass while EIT achieved a 15 s cadence (operating in "shutterless mode", SoHO JOP 80) in the Fexii (195 Å) bandpass. These high cadence observations in two complementary wavelengths have revealed the existence of weak transient disturbances in an extended coronal loop system. These propagating disturbances (PDs) seem to be a common phenomenon in this part of the active region. The disturbances originate from small scale brightenings at the footpoints of the loops and propagate along the loops. The projected propagation speeds roughly vary between 65 and 150 km s^-1 for both instruments which is close to and below the expected sound speed in the coronal loops. The measured slow magnetoacoustic propagation speeds seem to suggest that the transients are sound (or slow) wave disturbances. This work differs from previous studies in the sense that it is based on a multi-wavelength observation of an entire loop bundle at high cadence by two EUV imagers. The observation of sound waves along the same path shows that they propagate along the same loop, suggesting that loops contain sharp temperature gradients and consist of either concentric shells or thin loop threads, at different temperatures.