Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
May 2011
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2011spd....42.1705m&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, SPD meeting #42, #17.05; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 43, 2011
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
Scientific paper
Nandy, Munoz, & Martens, have published a kinematic dynamo model that successfully reproduces the main characteristics of the recent extended solar minimum (Nature 2011, 471, 80). The model depends on the solar meridional flow and its return flow along the tachocline determining the period and character of the cycle. In particular Nandy et al. found that a meridional flow that is fast in the first half of the cycle and then slows down around solar maximum, can lead to an extended minimum with the characteristics of the recent minimum: an extended period without sunspots and weak polar fields.
It has been pointed out that the observed surface meridional flows over the last cycle do not fit the pattern assumed by Nandy et al. Hathaway & Rightmire (Science 2010, 327-1350) find that the meridional speed of small magnetic surface elements observed by SoHO/MDI decreased around solar maximum and has not yet recovered. Basu & Antia (ApJ 2010, 717, 488) find surface plasma meridional flow speeds that are lower at solar maximum 23 than at the surrounding minima, which is different from both Hathaway and Nandy.
While there is no physical reason that solar surface flows -- both differential rotation and meridional flow -- would vary in lockstep with flows at greater depth, as the large radial gradients near the surface clearly indicate, and while Nandy et al. have demonstrated that the deeper flows dominate the net meridional mass flow, we find that there is in effect a very satisfying agreement between the observational results of Hathaway & Rightmire, Basu & Antia, and the model assumptions of Nandy, Munoz, & Martens. We present an analytical model that reconciles the first two, followed by a hydrodynamical model that demonstrates the consistency of these observational results with the model assumptions of Nandy et al.
Martens Petrus C.
Muñoz-Jaramillo Andrés
Nandy Dibyendu
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