The Flux-Tube Texture of the Solar Wind

Details The Flux-Tube Texture of the Solar Wind The Flux-Tube Texture of the Solar Wind

Dec 2006

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2006agufmsh43c..05b&link_type=abstract

American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2006, abstract #SH43C-05

Physics

2159 Plasma Waves And Turbulence, 2164 Solar Wind Plasma, 2169 Solar Wind Sources

Scientific paper

The solar wind at 1 AU is full of discontinuities. These can be seen by sudden large changes in (a) the magnetic-field direction, (b) the magnetic-field strength, (c) the plasma properties (density, ion temperature, electron temperature, ionic composition), (d) the flow velocity, and (e) the hot-electron flux from the sun. The discontinuities are interpreted here to be the walls of independently moving magnetic flux tubes (plasma tubes) with a large spread of orientations about the Parker-spiral direction. This flux-tube texture of the plasma has strong implications for the flow properties of the solar wind: (a) much of the fluctuating flow of the solar wind is owed to the relative motions between neighboring flux tubes and (b) large-scale solar-wind flows often fracture along the flux-tube interfaces. The flux-tube texture also affects the properties of the MHD turbulence in the solar wind: (a) the turbulence is confined to the insides of the flux tubes, (b) Fourier analysis of the turbulence can be obscured by power from the flux-tube interfaces, and (c) the driving of solar-wind turbulence from low- frequency fluctuations may need rethinking. Using measurements from ACE, the statistical properties of the flux tubes at 1 AU are examined, including their sizes, shapes, and orientations. Mapping the flux tubes back to the rotating sun, they are statistically compared with granule- and supergranule-sized structures near the solar surface.

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