Issue |
A&A
Volume 520, September-October 2010
|
|
---|---|---|
Article Number | A37 | |
Number of page(s) | 8 | |
Section | The Sun | |
DOI | https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201014240 | |
Published online | 27 September 2010 |
Signatures of transition region explosive events in hydrogen Ly
profiles
M. Zhang1 - L.-D. Xia2,3 - H. Tian3,4 - Y. Chen2
1 - CAS Key Laboratory of Basic Plasma Physics, School of
Earth and Space Sciences, Univ. of Science and Technology of China,
Hefei, Anhui, PR China
2
- Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory of Optical Astronomy and
Solar-Terrestrial Environment, School of Space Science and Physics,
Shandong Univ. at Weihai, Weihai, Shandong, PR China
3 - Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung,
Max-Planck-Str. 2, 37191 Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany
4 - School of Earth and Space Sciences, Peking University, PR China
Received 11 February 2010 / Accepted 10 May 2010
Abstract
Aims. We search for signatures of transition region explosive events (EEs) in hydrogen Ly profiles. The relationship between the peak emission of Ly
profiles and the wing emission of C II and O VI during EEs is investigated.
Methods. Two rasters made by the SUMER (Solar Ultraviolet
Measurements of Emitted Radiation) instrument onboard SOHO in a
quiet-Sun region and an equatorial coronal hole were selected for our
study. Transition-region explosive events were identified from profiles
of C II 1037 Å and O VI 1032 Å, respectively. We compared Ly profiles during EEs with those averaged in the entire quiet-Sun and coronal-hole regions.
Results. We find that the central part of Ly profiles
reverses more and the distance of the two peaks becomes larger during
EEs, both in the coronal hole and in the quiet Sun. The average Ly
profile of the EEs detected by C II has an obviously stronger blue peak. During EEs, there is a clear correlation between the increased peak emission of Ly
profiles and the enhanced wing emission of the C II and O VI lines. The correlation is more pronounced for the Ly
peaks and C II wings, and less significant for the Ly
blue peak and O VI blue wing. We also find that the Ly
profiles are more reversed in the coronal hole than in the quiet Sun.
Conclusions. We suggest that the jets produced by EEs emit the Doppler-shifted Ly photons, causing enhanced emission at positions of the peaks of Ly
profiles. The more-reversed Ly
profiles
confirm the presence of higher opacity in the coronal hole than in the
quiet Sun. The finding that EEs modify the Ly
line
profile in QS and CHs implies that one should be careful in the
modeling and interpretation of relevant observational data.
Key words: Sun: transition region - Sun: UV radiation - line: profiles
1 Introduction
Transition-region (TR) explosive events (EEs) are small-scale
dynamic phenomena often observed in the far and extreme ultraviolet
(FUV/EUV) spectral lines formed in the solar transition region. They
were detected for the first time by the NRL/HRTS instrument
(Brueckne & Bartoe 1983). Since 1996, data obtained by the SUMER (Solar
Ultraviolet Measurements of Emitted Radiation) spectrograph
(Wilhelm et al. 1997,1995) have been widely used to study EEs. With
high spatial and spectral resolution and wide spectral coverage,
SUMER has greatly increased our knowledge of EEs. EEs are
characterized by non-Gaussian and broad profiles with enhancements
in the blue/red wings with an average line-of-sight Doppler
velocities of 100 km s-1 (Innes et al. 1997a; Dere et al. 1989). They have a
small spatial scale of about 1800 km and a short lifetime of about
60 s on average (Teriaca et al. 2004). Explosive events tend to occur
along the boundaries of the magnetic network, where weak
mixed-polarity magnetic features are present
(Teriaca et al. 2004; Porter & Dere 1991; Chae et al. 1998). Because EEs are often found to be
associated with magnetic cancellation and reveal bi-directional
flows with high velocities comparable to the local Alfvén
velocity, it has been suggested that they are a consequence of
small-scale magnetic reconnections (Innes et al. 1997b). Sometimes EEs
are found to burst repeatedly in the same region, possibly a result
of repetitive reconnections triggered by P-mode oscillations or
transverse oscillations of the flux tubes
(Ning et al. 2004; Chen & Priest 2006; Doyle et al. 2006). Although EEs are best seen in typical
TR lines, they can generally be detected in spectral lines with
formation temperatures ranging from
104 to
K
(Teriaca et al. 2002; Popescu et al. 2007; Madjarska & Doyle 2002).
![]() |
Figure 1: Two EIT images in the 195 Å passband. The white rectangles indicate the scanned regions by SUMER ( left: QS right: ECH), the curve in the right image outlines the ECH boundary. |
Open with DEXTER |
Table 1: Information of the SUMER observations.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the solar atmosphere, and
its resonance lines play an important role in the energy transport
of the Sun (Fontenla et al. 1988). Ly is the second prominent line in
the H Lyman series. Important information on the highly dynamic TR
structures may be carried by the profiles of this line. Early rocket
and satellite observations obtained some Ly
profiles
(Vial 1982; Reeves 1976; Lemaire et al. 1978). However, the profiles obtained in
these early observations suffered from geocoronal absorption.
Theoretical models suggest that the reversal at the center of the
Ly
profiles is formed in the upper chromosphere and lower
transition region, while the wings formed in the lower chromosphere
(Gouttebroze et al. 1978; Barsi et al. 1979; Schmieder et al. 1998).
Recently, the Ly profiles obtained with the SUMER instrument have
been extensively investigated. Most Ly
profiles appear to have a
non-Gaussian shape with a self-reversal at the center and two peaks
aside, with different shapes in different regions
(Curdt et al. 2008; Warren et al. 1998; Tian et al. 2009b; Vial et al. 2007; Schmieder et al. 2007; Tian et al. 2009a; Xia et al. 2004; Tian et al. 2009c; Curdt et al. 2010; Heinzel et al. 2001; Xia 2003).
It is believed that the asymmetries of the Ly
profiles are
probably caused by the combined effect of flows and opacity in
different layers of the solar atmosphere
(Tian et al. 2009b; Fontenla et al. 2002; Gunár et al. 2008). Higher order Lyman line profiles
were also studied. For example, Warren et al. (1998) find that the
average profiles for Ly
through Ly
(n=5) are
self-reversed and the remaining lines are flat-topped, and
Madjarska & Doyle (2002) find that profiles through Ly-6 to Ly-11 reveal
self-absorption during EEs. Madjarska & Doyle (2002) suggest that the
observed central depression during EEs in Lyman lines may be mainly
due to an emission increase in the wings.
Although previous studies have demonstrated that hydrogen Lyman
series behave very differently in different solar regions, it is
clear that more data need to be analyzed to advance our knowledge.
As the second prominent line of the hydrogen Lyman series, Ly has
been frequently used in SUMER observations, so it can provide a
valuable tool to diagnose different structures and properties in
various solar regions.
In this paper, we use co-temporal observations of O VI,
C II, and Ly in a quiet-Sun region (QS) and an equatorial
coronal hole (ECH) to search for signatures of EEs in Ly
profiles
in these different solar regions. The correlation between the
increased peak emission of Ly
profiles and the enhanced wing
emission of O VI and C II is investigated and
discussed.
2 Observations and data analysis
Information of the SUMER observations is listed in Table 1.
The first data set was taken in the quiet Sun, and the second one
was obtained in an equatorial coronal hole. The solar X (east-west)
refers to the coordinate range of the scanned region. The solar Y
(south-north) refers to the coordinate of the slit center. Each
dataset includes O VI (1031.9 Å,
K),
C II (1037.0 Å,
K), and H I Ly
(1025.7 Å,
K) lines and a series of
full detector readouts at different wavelengths. The scanned regions
are outlined and overlapped on the EIT 195 images (see
Fig. 1).
We applied the standard procedures for correcting and calibrating
the SUMER raw data. They include decompression, reversal,
flat-field, dead-time, local-gain, and geometrical corrections. We
extracted the raster scan coordinates from the head-data files of
SUMER and eliminated the effects of the solar rotation. The
coalignment of images obtained by different instruments was achieved
through a cross-correlation between the Ly intensity maps, the EIT
images and MDI magnetograms.
EEs were identified by O VI and C II profiles. We
first used the procedure described in Xia (2003) to deduce the
widths of all spectra and calculated the standard deviation of the
widths. We disregarded the noisy profiles with a peak intensity
below the half-peak intensity of the average profile. Then the
profiles with a width greater than three standard deviations
(3)
were singled out for further visual inspection to
finally determine the occurrence of EEs. Our method is similar to
those used by Teriaca et al. (2004).
3 Results
![]() |
Figure 2:
EIT images in the 195 Å passband, magnetograms (unit: G) obtained by MDI, intensity
maps (unit: counts/30 s/line) of Ly |
Open with DEXTER |
Figure 2 shows the EIT images in the 195 Å passband,
magnetograms obtained by MDI, intensity maps of Ly,
C II,
and O VI. In the upper panel, to remove the interference of a
coronal bright point (seen in the bottom of the EIT map), we used
only the region above the horizontal line to calculate the averaged
quiet-Sun profiles. In the lower panel, the boundary of the
equatorial coronal hole was determined with the intensity threshold
of the EIT image (Xia 2003). The magnetogram, intensity maps of
Ly
,
C II, and O VI are overlaid by black contours to
outline the chromospheric network, which occupies 33% of the whole
area and is characterized by the highest intensities of the
continuum around 1032 Å. It is clear that the network coincides
with the concentration of strong photospheric magnetic fields. In
the QS region, strong magnetic fields with positive (white) and
negative (black) polarities are both present inside the network,
while in the ECH region the network regions are dominated by strong
positive magnetic fields and only a few weak mixed-polarity fields
are present. The network structures indicated by the continuum
intensity coincide closely with the strong emission of the three
lines. There are many loop-like structures that have visible
footpoints lying on the edge of networks and extend into the cell
interiors. The loop-like structures can be identified more easily in
the ECH than in the QS. A more detailed discussion about the
morphology in these two regions can be found in Xia et al. (2004).
Explosive events are best seen in typical transition-region lines
like Si IV (
K), and they can generally
be detected in spectral lines with formation temperatures ranging
from
104 to
K
(Teriaca et al. 2002; Popescu et al. 2007; Madjarska & Doyle 2002). Here we use two
transition-region lines C II and O VI, respectively,
to identify EEs. The identified events are referred to as
``C II EEs'' and ``O VI EEs'' hereinafter. In
Fig. 2, the red ``+'' in intensity maps of C II and
O VI mark locations of pixels where EEs were identified. We
find 136 EE pixels detected by the C II line and 167 by the
O VI line in the QS, and 70 and 78 correspondingly in the
ECH. Neighboring EE pixels in each spectral line are regarded as
given by a single event. The average occurrence rates of EEs in both
regions are then estimated to be about
cm-2 s-1, which is comparable to the one
obtained by Teriaca et al. (2004) in a QS region. It is clear that most
of the EEs lie in the network or on the edge of the network, in line
with previous studies. Furthermore, it is interesting to find that
the pixel positions of the EEs observed in the C II and
O VI lines are not spatially overlaid with each other in most
cases. However, this does not mean that there is no connection
between these two lines during the events. By inspection of detailed
line profiles, when an EE is detected only in one spectral line
(i.e., with the line width wider than 3
), the other line
often responds simultaneously and reveals a significant non-Gaussian
profile although its line width is still smaller than 3
.
The
formation temperature of the C II line is about
K, which is an order lower than for the O VI
line. This difference in line temperature may result in a different
spectral response to an EE. The response may depend on the height
where an EE occurs. A time delay may also exist in the response of
the high-temperature line with respect to the lower temperature
line, if an EE bursts at a lower height.
![]() |
Figure 3:
O VI, Ly |
Open with DEXTER |
We selected four individual EEs at different locations detected
simultaneously by both the C II and O VI lines (two in
QS and two in ECH, two dominated by red peaks and two by blue
peaks). These EEs are marked on the EIT images shown in
Fig. 2. In Fig. 3, we present EE profiles of the
three lines including O VI, Ly,
and C II, as well as
the mean profiles in the whole QS and ECH. The emission enhancements
in the wings of the O VI and Ly
lines are revealed better
by the dotted lines, which are given by subtracting the mean
profiles from the EE ones. We find that during the EEs, velocities
between 50-100 km s-1 are clearly present on the O VI line
wings, while the C II line presents a significant bursting
feature. We can only plot the profiles with Doppler velocity of
80 km s-1 for the C II line owing to the presence of
another two lines (C II at 1036.3 Å and O VI at 1037.6 Å). It can be seen that the corresponding Ly
profiles
behave rather differently with a stronger enhancement at the wings
and a deeper reversal at the center. In most cases, the distance of
the two peaks of Ly
profiles is apparently greater than that of
the mean Ly
profiles, and the intensity and position of the wing
peaks of the Ly
line correlate with those of the O VI line.
For the three events shown in the first, third and fourth rows of
Fig. 3, their Ly
profiles show a very small change in
intensity in the line center compared to the mean profile, although
their wings are very strongly enhanced. The above descriptions are
only for the four selected individual events detected simultaneously
with both the O VI and C II lines. The more general
properties of the observed events will be analyzed below.
![]() |
Figure 4:
Different kinds of average O VI, Ly |
Open with DEXTER |
Figure 4 shows different kinds of average O VI,
Ly,
and C II profiles observed in the QS and ECH regions.
The central line position of the profile averaged in the relevant QS
or ECH region is plotted in each panel. According to the intensity
of the Ly
line, we divided each region of ECH and QS into three
parts: top 33%, lower 33%, and intermediate-radiation regions.
Then we calculated the average O VI, Ly
,
and C II
profiles in each radiation region. We find that the red peak of
Ly
profile is higher than the blue peak in the QS, and the trend
becomes more apparent with increasing intensity of Ly
(seen in
bottom panels). In the ECH, the self reversal at the center of the
Ly
profile is obvious, and a deeper one is observed with
increasing intensity, while the strengths of two peaks are basically
the same (seen in top panels).
In Fig. 4, we also plot the average O VI, Ly,
and
C II profiles of the O VI EEs and the C II
ones, respectively. It can be seen that the average Ly
profiles of
the EEs in both ECH and QS regions show a deeper self-reversal and
two prominent wing peaks, and the trend is more obvious for the
C II EEs than the O VI ones. In the ECH, compared with
the mean ECH profile, the average O VI profile of the
O VI EEs has a broader width and is shifted towards the blue
side, while that of the C II EEs is not very different. The
C II line of the O VI EEs is on average broader than
for the mean ECH profile, and the one of the C II EEs is even
broader. They both tend to have a more enhanced blue wing. And
again, the blue wing of the C II EEs is more enhanced than
that of the O VI ones. For the Ly
line, the average profile
of the O VI EEs is almost symmetric, and that of the
C II EEs has an obviously stronger blue peak. The distances
of the two peaks observed in both the O VI EEs and
C II EEs are larger than that of the mean ECH profile, and
the one for the C II EEs is the largest. In the QS, similar
trends can be found for the widths of the C II and
O VI lines. However, the C II profile of the
O VI EEs shows a more enhanced red wing, which may be at
least partly caused by the greatly enhanced blue wing of another
O VI line at 1037.6 Å. And, for the Ly
line, the red peak
is stronger in the QS, in contrast to the features observed in the
ECH. The distance of the two peaks in the QS also shows a similar
trend to the ECH.
![]() |
Figure 5:
Relationship between photon counts of blue/red wing
of O VI and C II profiles and photon counts of blue/red peak of Ly |
Open with DEXTER |
To quantify the correlation between the increased peak emission of
Ly profiles and the enhanced wing emission of O VI, we
calculated the photon counts of blue/red wing (Doppler velocity from
30 km s-1 to 100 km s-1) of O VI profiles and the photon counts
of blue/red peak (Doppler velocity from 30 km s-1 to 70 km s-1) of
Ly
profiles at EE pixels in the QS and ECH, respectively. In the
same way, we also calculated the correlation coefficients between
the C II wings (Doppler velocity from 30 km s-1 to 70 km s-1) and
the Ly
peaks. Figure 5 presents the corresponding
scatter plots. We also list the calculated correlation coefficients
in Table 2, which are all positive. It seems that the
enhancement of the Ly
peaks represents the signature of EEs.
Furthermore, the correlation seems to be quite good for all red/blue
wings of C II profiles and all red wings of O VI
profiles. For the O VI line, the correlation seems to be
weaker on the blue than on the red side. The formation temperature
of the C II line is much closer to the temperature in the
Ly
line than in the O VI line. This may explain the better
correlation between the increased peak emission of the Ly
line and
the enhanced C II wings during EEs.
4 Discussion
The major finding of this paper is that there is a clear correlation
between the increased peak emission of Ly profiles and the
enhanced wing emission of the transition-region lines, especially
the C II line, which has a formation temperature close to
that of the Ly
line. This result indicates that EEs can greatly
modify Ly
profiles, especially the two peaks of the profiles. This
clear correlation suggests that EEs are responsible for the enhanced
peak emission of Ly
.
We can assume that the Ly emission during EEs has two components,
the background emission and the jet emission. The former is the
emission from the background QS or CH. Its source lies in the upper
chromosphere and lower TR. As it propagates to the upper atmosphere,
emission from the central part of the profile is absorbed by the
atomic hydrogen, revealing a central depression in the profile. On
the other hand, the jet emission is very different. Jets produced by
EEs can heat the relatively cold background plasma, causing enhanced
ionization and further emission in the whole profile of colder
lines. This is confirmed by the jet emission of C II shown in
Fig. 3. At the same time, the plasma can be accelerated to
a much higher velocity causing greatly enhanced emission in their
line wings. Since the jets are usually bidirectional with high
speed, the Ly
photons emitted by the jets should also be
Doppler-shifted towards both longer and shorter wavelengths. If the
speed of the jets has a line-of-sight component, we should observe
this Doppler-shifted Ly
emission, which is added to the
almost-at-rest background Ly
emission, causing enhancement of the
peaks of the background Ly
profiles. The jet-emitted Ly
profiles
experience much less radiative transfer process. This is because the
EEs are most prominent in the middle and upper TR, above which the
density is very low and the atomic hydrogen cannot significantly
absorb the emission from below. Also, the almost-at-rest coronal
atmosphere could not absorb the Doppler-shifted jet emission because
of the lack of the wavelength match.
Table 2: Correlation coefficients of enhanced emission during EEs.
Madjarska & Doyle (2002) find that profiles through Ly-6 to Ly-11 reveal
self-absorption during EEs. The authors conclude that the observed
central depression during EEs in Lyman lines may be mainly due to an
emission increase in the wings. Our analysis of the Ly profiles
during EEs suggests that the jets produced by EEs emit
Doppler-shifted Ly
photons and cause enhanced emission at the
peaks of Ly
profiles. Our result complements the one in
Madjarska & Doyle (2002). In addition, most previous studies on EE-like
dynamic events have been conducted based on analysis of
optically-thin spectral lines (such as Si IV and O VI lines). Our
result further indicates that Ly
and other Lyman lines could be
used to identify these transient events even in the absence of
strong spectral lines in the transition region. Since Ly
is the
second prominent line in the hydrogen Lyman series and is much more
frequently used in observations, the variation in the Ly
profiles
provides a good tool to diagnose different structures and properties
in different regions. Our finding of the signatures of EEs in
Ly
profiles is thus helpful for investigating the thermodynamics
of the jets produced by EEs.
The average Ly profiles of EEs have an obviously stronger red peak
in the QS, while in the ECH the blue peak seems to be stronger for
the C II EEs. The different relative strengths of the
blue-shifted and red-shifted jet-components might account for the
different asymmetries. In Sect. 3, we discussed the average line
widths of EE pixels and found the C II profile of the
C II EEs in the ECH has an enhanced blue wing that is more
pronounced than other profiles. Correspondingly, the blue peak of
Ly
is relatively stronger and the peak separation is larger. The
blue shift of EEs may cause the relatively significant blue peak of
Ly
profiles. As we know, fast bidirectional jets can lead to the
separation of the two peaks. From line profiles of the four typical
EEs, we suggest that the different asymmetries of Ly
profiles
seems to be a result of different speed and strength of EE jets.
In the quiet Sun, most Ly profiles are found to have a stronger
red peak (Warren et al. 1998). In fact, the Ly
profile has different
shapes in different regions. Xia (2003) and Xia et al. (2004) found
that there are more Ly
profiles with stronger blue peaks in
equatorial coronal holes than in the quiet Sun, so that the red-peak
asymmetry of the average Ly
profile is less pronounced in the ECH.
Tian et al. (2009b) found that Ly
profiles in polar coronal hole have
a stronger blue-peak, which is opposite to those in the QS. Here we
find that the average Ly
profile in the ECH has almost symmetrical
peaks. The different asymmetries of the Ly
profiles might reflect
different flow fields of the upper solar atmosphere in different
parts of the Sun. The most prominent difference in systematic flow
systems between the polar coronal hole and quiet-Sun regions is that
upflows are predominant in the upper TR of polar coronal holes
(Hassler et al. 1999; Tu et al. 2005; Dammasch et al. 1999; Tian et al. 2010), while upflows are
localized at network junctions in the upper TR of the quiet Sun
(Hassler et al. 1999; Tian et al. 2009d,2008). In ECHs, the flow pattern in the
upper TR might be similar to the one in the polar coronal hole, but
the magnitude of the upflows might be smaller
(Raju 2009; Xia et al. 2003; Aiouaz et al. 2005), so the average Ly
profile in
the ECH reveals an almost symmetrical shape in an intermediate phase
between the red-peak dominance in the quiet Sun and blue-peak
dominance in polar coronal holes. Another possibility might come
from the higher opacity in the coronal hole. Our data reveal that
the Ly
profiles are on average more reversed in the ECH than in
the QS, which indicates that the opacity is higher in the ECH. This
finding complements the previous finding of higher opacity in polar
coronal holes than in the quiet Sun (Tian et al. 2009b). We may assume
that the Ly
line behaves in more or less similar ways to typical
TR lines in the quiet Sun. In polar coronal holes, the opacity is so
high that the Ly
line now behaves like Ly
,
with a stronger blue
peak (Curdt & Tian 2010). If the opacity in the ECH is higher than in
the QS but lower than in the polar coronal holes, then it is not
surprising we observe the almost symmetrical Ly
profile in the
ECH.
The average and four typical Ly profiles imply emission
contribution from the wings of EEs. We qualitatively analyzed the
relevance between the wings of EEs and peaks of Ly
profiles. The
relevance between C II wings of EEs and Ly
peaks is very
significant, but for the O VI line, the relevance between
blue wings of EEs and blue peaks is generally poorer than between
their red counterparts, especially in the ECH. As we know,
C II has a formation temperature close to that of Ly
,
which
is about an order lower than for O VI. During EEs, it seems
that, in general, the variation in Ly
peaks correlates more
closely with that of C II. However, the scan data used here
have no information on time. A larger error appears if the time
difference exists among the different lines that are emitted in
different layers of the solar atmosphere when EE occurs, especially
when we are using the scan data with a longer exposure time. For
example, Madjarska & Doyle (2002) have observed a time delay of about
20-40 s in the response of the transition-region line (S VI,
200 000 K) with respect to the chromospheric line (H I Ly 6,
20 000 K), when an EE can be seen in a chromospheric line. Therefore,
this conclusion should be verified in the future by analyzing more
data, especially time-series data with short exposure times.
Previous studies have confirmed that the line shapes of Ly and
Ly
were significantly affected by a quasi-steady flow field in the
transition region (Curdt et al. 2008; Tian et al. 2009a). In this paper, we find
the Ly
profiles are also modified by the transient flow field
generated by EEs in QS and ECH. This finding implies that one should
be careful when modeling and interpreting such observational data.
According to our results, Lyman profiles are affected by both EEs
and opacity, especially when observed at a high spatial and temporal
resolution. When the underlying dynamic process of the solar
atmosphere is analyzed by using Ly
and other Lyman lines, one
should consider not only the line source function and opacity, but
also the flow field in the transition region, including both the
quasi-steady and transient flows. For instance, one needs to take
all these factors into account for the numerical simulation to
explain the observed line shapes of Lyman series and their relation
with the flow field.
The Ly line is the second strongest line of hydrogen Lyman series.
Some observational features of this line are similar to those of
Ly
,
while some are very different. The opacity of Ly
is much
higher than for Ly
.
It is interesting to ask whether the behavior
of Ly
profile is similar during EEs, which needs to be addressed
in the future. Since hydrogen is the most abundant component of the
Sun and Ly
is the most prominent line emitted by the chromosphere
and lower transition region, such studies could be important for the
future high-resolution observations of Lyman lines. Moreover, it is
also interesting to look for signatures of other solar dynamic
events (such as flares and CMEs) in Lyman lines in order to study
these dramatic eruptions. As the formation height of Lyman lines in
the solar atmosphere is relatively low, their response to the events
could be used to study the initiations of these eruptions and to
advance the predicting technology of the associated space weather
events.
5 Conclusion
We used co-temporal observations of O VI, C II, and
Ly in a quiet-Sun region and an equatorial coronal hole to search
for signatures of explosive events in Ly
profiles. We find that
EEs have significant impacts on the profiles of Ly
.
During EEs,
the center of Ly
profiles reverses more and the distance between
the two peaks becomes larger, both in the equational coronal hole
and in the quiet Sun. The average Ly
profile of the EEs detected
by C II has an obvious stronger blue peak. Statistical
analysis showed that there is a clear correlation between the
increased peak emission of Ly
profiles and the enhanced wing
emission of C II and O VI. The correlation is more
obvious for the Ly
peaks and C II wings, and less
significant for the Ly
blue peak and O VI blue wing. It
indicates that the jets produced by EEs emit Doppler-shifted
Ly
photons, causing enhanced emission at positions of the peaks of
Ly
profiles. The more-reversed Ly
profiles confirm the higher
opacity in the coronal hole than in the quiet Sun.
The authors thank the referee for the comments and suggestions that improved the manuscript. The SUMER project is financially supported by DLR, CNES, NASA, and the ESA PRODEX Programme (Swiss contribution). SUMER is an instrument onboard SOHO, a mission operated by ESA and NASA. We thank Dr. W. Curdt for the helpful discussions. The work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China(NSFC) under contracts 40974105, 40774080, 40890162, and NSBRSF G2006CB806304 in China.
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All Tables
Table 1: Information of the SUMER observations.
Table 2: Correlation coefficients of enhanced emission during EEs.
All Figures
![]() |
Figure 1: Two EIT images in the 195 Å passband. The white rectangles indicate the scanned regions by SUMER ( left: QS right: ECH), the curve in the right image outlines the ECH boundary. |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 2:
EIT images in the 195 Å passband, magnetograms (unit: G) obtained by MDI, intensity
maps (unit: counts/30 s/line) of Ly |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 3:
O VI, Ly |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 4:
Different kinds of average O VI, Ly |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
![]() |
Figure 5:
Relationship between photon counts of blue/red wing
of O VI and C II profiles and photon counts of blue/red peak of Ly |
Open with DEXTER | |
In the text |
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