arXiv subjects

Yuming Wang

Publications and source records attributed to Yuming Wang.

144 records · Page 8Linked to original sources

arXiv2013

Waiting Times of Quasi-homologous Coronal Mass Ejections from Super Active Regions

Why and how may some active regions (ARs) frequently produce coronal mass ejections (CMEs)? It is one of the key questions to deepen our understanding of the mechanisms and processes of energy accumulation and sudden release in ARs and to improve our capability of space weather prediction. Although some case studies have been made, the question is still far from fully answered. This issue is now being tried to address statistically through an investigation of waiting times of quasi-homologous CMEs from super ARs in solar cycle 23. It is found that the waiting times of quasi-homologous CMEs have a two-component distribution with a separation at about 18 hours. The first component is a Gaussian-like distribution with a peak at about 7 hours, which indicates a tight physical connection between these quasi-homologous CMEs. The likelihood of occurrences of two or more CMEs faster than 1200 km s-1 from the same AR within 18 hours is about 20%. Furthermore, the correlation analysis among CME waiting times, CME speeds and CME occurrence rates reveals that these quantities are independent to each other, suggesting that the perturbation by preceding CMEs rather than free energy input be the direct cause of quasi-homologous CMEs. The peak waiting time of 7 hours probably characterize the time scale of the growth of instabilities triggered by preceding CMEs. This study uncovers more clues from a statistical perspective for us to understand quasi-homologous CMEs as well as CME-rich ARs.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2012

Source Region of the Decameter - Hectometric Type II Radio Burst: Shock - Streamer Interaction Region

D-H type II radio bursts are widely thought to be caused by the coronal mass ejections (CMEs). However, it is still unclear where the exact source of the type IIs on the shock surface is. We identify the source regions of the decameter-hectometric (D--H) type IIs based on imaging observations from SOHO/LASCO and the radio dynamic spectrum from Wind/Waves. The analysis of two well-observed events suggests that the sources of these two events are located in the interaction regions between shocks and streamers, and that the shocks are enhanced significantly in these regions.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2012

Slow Magneto-acoustic Waves Observed above Quiet-Sun Region in a Dark Cavity

Waves play a crucial role in diagnosing the plasma properties of various structures in the solar corona and coronal heating. Slow magneto-acoustic (MA) waves are one of the important magnetohydrodynamic waves. In past decades, numerous slow MA waves were detected above the active regions and coronal holes, but rarely found elsewhere. Here, we investigate a `tornado'-like structure consisting of quasi-periodic streaks within a dark cavity at about 40--110 Mm above the quiet-Sun region on 2011 September 25. Our analysis reveals that these streaks are actually slow MA wave trains. The properties of these wave trains, including the phase speed, compression ratio, kinetic energy density, etc., are similar to those of the reported slow MA waves, except that the period of these waves is about 50 s, much shorter than the typical reported values (3--5 minutes).

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2012

Contracting and Erupting Components of Sigmoidal Active Regions

It is recently noted that solar eruptions can be associated with the contraction of coronal loops that are not involved in magnetic reconnection processes. In this paper, we investigate five coronal eruptions originating from four sigmoidal active regions, using high-cadence, high-resolution narrowband EUV images obtained by the Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO}). The magnitudes of the flares associated with the eruptions range from the GOES-class B to X. Owing to the high-sensitivity and broad temperature coverage of the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) onboard SDO, we are able to identify both the contracting and erupting components of the eruptions: the former is observed in cold AIA channels as the contracting coronal loops overlying the elbows of the sigmoid, and the latter is preferentially observed in warm/hot AIA channels as an expanding bubble originating from the center of the sigmoid. The initiation of eruption always precedes the contraction, and in the energetically mild events (B and C flares), it also precedes the increase in GOES soft X-ray fluxes. In the more energetic events, the eruption is simultaneous with the impulsive phase of the nonthermal hard X-ray emission. These observations confirm the loop contraction as an integrated process in eruptions with partially opened arcades. The consequence of contraction is a new equilibrium with reduced magnetic energy, as the contracting loops never regain their original positions. The contracting process is a direct consequence of flare energy release, as evidenced by the strong correlation of the maximal contracting speed, and strong anti-correlation of the time delay of contraction relative to expansion, with the peak soft X-ray flux. This is also implied by the relationship between contraction and expansion, i.e., their timing and speed.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2011

Statistical Study of Coronal Mass Ejection Source Locations: II. Role of Active Regions in CME Production

This is the second paper of the statistical study of coronal mass ejection (CME) source locations, in which the relationship between CMEs and active regions (ARs) is statistically studied on the basis of the information of CME source locations and the ARs automatically extracted from magnetic synoptic charts of Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI) during 1997 -- 1998. It is found that about 63% of the CMEs are related with ARs, at least about 53% of the ARs produced one or more CMEs, and particularly about 14% of ARs are CME-rich (3 or more CMEs were generated) during one transit across the visible disk. Several issues are then tried to clarify: whether or not the CMEs originating from ARs are distinct from others, whether or not the CME kinematics depend on AR properties, and whether or not the CME productivity depends on AR properties. The statistical results suggest that (1) there is no evident difference between AR-related and non-AR-related CMEs in terms of CME speed, acceleration and width, (2) the size, strength and complexity of ARs do little with the kinematic properties of CMEs, but have significant effects on the CME productivity, and (3) the sunspots in all the most productive ARs at least belong to $βγ$ type, whereas 90% of those in CME-less ARs are $α$ or $β$ type only. A detailed analysis on CME-rich ARs further reveals that (1) the distribution of the waiting time of same-AR CMEs, consists of two parts with a separation at about 15 hours, which implies that the CMEs with a waiting time shorter than 15 hours are probably truly physical related, and (2) an AR tends to produce such related same-AR CMEs at a pace of 8 hours, but cannot produce two or more fast CMEs (>800 km/s) within a time interval of 15 hours. This interesting phenomenon is particularly discussed.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2011

Critical Height for the Destabilization of Solar Prominences: Statistical Results from STEREO Observations

At which height will a prominence inclined to be unstable, or where is the most probable critical height for the prominence destabilization? This question is statistically studied based on 362 solar limb prominences well-recognized by SLIPCAT from 2007 April to the end of 2009. We found that there are about 71% disrupted prominences (DPs), among which about 42% of them did not erupt successfully and about 89% of them experienced a sudden destabilization (SD) process. After a comprehensive analysis of the DPs, the following findings are discovered. (1) Most DPs become unstable at the height of 0.06 -- 0.14 R$_\odot$ from the solar surface, and there are two most probable critical heights, at which a prominence is much likely to get unstable; the primary one is 0.13 R$_\odot$ and the secondary one is 0.19 R$_\odot$. (2) There exists upper limit for the erupting velocity of eruptive prominences (EPs), which decreases following a power law with increasing height and mass; the kinetic energy of EPs accordingly has an upper limit too, which decreases as critical height increases. (3) Stable prominences (SPs) are generally longer and heavier than DPs, and not higher than 0.4 R$_\odot$. (4) About 62% of EPs were associated with CMEs; but there is no difference in apparent properties between EPs associated with and without CMEs.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2011

Quantitative Analysis of CME Deflections in the Corona

In this paper, ten CME events viewed by the STEREO twin spacecraft are analyzed to study the deflections of CMEs during their propagation in the corona. Based on the three-dimensional information of the CMEs derived by the graduated cylindrical shell (GCS) model [Thernisien et al., 2006], it is found that the propagation directions of eight CMEs had changed. By applying the theoretical method proposed by Shen et al. [2011] to all the CMEs, we found that the deflections are consistent, in strength and direction, with the gradient of the magnetic energy density. There is a positive correlation between the deflection rate and the strength of the magnetic energy density gradient and a weak anti-correlation between the deflection rate and the CME speed. Our results suggest that the deflections of CMEs are mainly controlled by the background magnetic field and can be quantitatively described by the magnetic energy density gradient (MEDG) model.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2011

Statistical Study of Coronal Mass Ejection Source Locations: Understanding CMEs Viewed in Coronagraphs

How to properly understand coronal mass ejections (CMEs) viewed in white-light coronagraphs is crucial to many relative researches in solar and space physics. The issue is now particularly addressed in this paper through studying the source locations of all the 1078 LASCO CMEs listed in CDAW CME catalog during 1997 -- 1998 and their correlation with CMEs' apparent parameters. By manually checking LASCO and EIT movies of these CMEs, we find that, except 231 CMEs whose source locations can not be identified due to poor data, there are 288 CMEs with location identified on the front-side solar disk, 234 CMEs appearing above solar limb, and 325 CMEs without evident eruptive signatures in the field of view of EIT. Based on the statistical results of CMEs' source locations, four physical issues, including (1) the missing rate of CMEs by SOHO LASCO and EIT, (2) the mass of CMEs, (3) the causes of halo CMEs and (4) the deflections of CMEs in the corona, are exhaustively analyzed. It is found that (1) about 32% of front-side CMEs can not be recognized by SOHO, (2) the brightness of a CME at any heliocentric distance is roughly positively correlated with its speed, and the CME mass derived from the brightness is probably overestimated, (3) both projection effect and violent eruption are the major causes of halo CMEs, and especially for limb halo CMEs, the latter is the primary one, (4) most CMEs deflected towards equator near the solar minimum, and these deflections can be classified into three types, the asymmetrical expansion, non-radial ejection, and the deflected propagation.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2011

Kinematic Evolution of a Slow CME in Corona Viewed by STEREO-B on 8 October 2007

We studied the kinematic evolution of the 8 October 2007 CME in the corona based on Sun-Earth Connection Coronal and Heliospheric Investigation (SECCHI) onboard satellite B of Solar TErrestrial RElations Observatory (STEREO). The observational results show that this CME obviously deflected to a lower latitude region for about 30$^\circ$ at the beginning. After this, the CME propagated radially. We also analyze the influence of the background magnetic field on the deflection of this CME. We find that the deflection of this CME at an early stage may be caused by the nonuniform distribution of the background magnetic field energy density and that the CME tended to propagate to the region with lower magnetic energy density. In addition, we found that the velocity profile of this gradual CME shows multiphased evolution during its propagation in COR1-B FOV. The CME velocity first kept at a constant of 23.1km.s-1. Then, it accelerated continuously with a positive acceleration of 7.6m.s-2.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2010

Influence of Coronal Holes on CMEs in Causing SEP Events

The issue of the influence of coronal holes (CHs) on coronal mass ejections (CMEs) in causing solar energetic particle (SEP) events is revisited. It is a continuation and extension of our previous work (Shen et al., 2006), in which no evident effect of CHs on CMEs in generating SEPs were found by statistically investigating 56 CME events. This result is consistent with the conclusion obtained by Kahler in 2004. In this paper, we extrapolate the coronal magnetic field, define CHs as the regions consisting of only open magnetic field lines and perform a similar analysis on this issue for totally 76 events by extending the study interval to the end of 2008. Three key parameters, CH proximity, CH area and CH relative position, are involved in the analysis. The new result confirms the previous conclusion that CHs did not show any evident effect on CMEs in causing SEP events.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2010

Solar LImb Prominence CAtcher and Tracker (SLIPCAT): An Automated System and Its Preliminary Statistical Results

In this paper, we present an automated system, which has the capability to catch and track solar limb prominences based on observations from EUV 304 passband. The characteristic parameters and their evolution, including height, position angle, area, length and brightness, are obtained without manual interventions. By applying the system to the STEREO-B/SECCHI/EUVI 304 data during 2007 April -2009 October, we obtain a total of 9477 well-tracked prominences and a catalog of these events available online at http://space.ustc.edu.cn/dreams/slipcat/. A detailed analysis of these prominences suggests that the system has a rather good performance. We have obtained several interesting statistical results based on the catalog. Most prominences appear below the latitude of 60 degrees and at the height of about 26 Mm above the solar surface. Most of them are quite stable during the period they are tracked. Nevertheless, some prominences have an upward speed of more than 100 km/s, and some others show significant downward and/or azimuthal speeds. There are strong correlations among the brightness, area and height. The expansion of a prominence is probably one major cause of its fading during the rising or erupting process.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2009

An Analytical Model Probing the Internal State of Coronal Mass Ejections Based on Observations of Their Expansions and Propagations

In this paper, a generic self-similar flux rope model is proposed to probe the internal state of CMEs in order to understand the thermodynamic process and expansion of CMEs in interplanetary space. Using this model, three physical parameters and their variations with heliocentric distance can be inferred based on coronagraph observations of CMEs' propagation and expansion. One is the polytropic index $Γ$ of the CME plasma, and the other two are the average Lorentz force and the thermal pressure force inside CMEs. By applying the model to the 2007 October 8 CME observed by STEREO/SECCHI, we find that (1) the polytropic index of the CME plasma increased from initially 1.24 to more than 1.35 quickly, and then slowly decreased to about 1.34; it suggests that there be continuously heat injected/converted into the CME plasma and the value of $Γ$ tends to be 4/3, a critical value inferred from the model for a force-free flux rope; (2) the Lorentz force directed inward while the thermal pressure force outward, and both of them decreased rapidly as the CME moved out; the direction of the two forces reveals that the thermal pressure force is the internal driver of the CME expansion whereas the Lorentz force prevented the CME from expanding. Some limitations of the model and approximations are discussed meanwhile.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2009

Magnetohydrodynamic Simulation of the Interaction between Interplanetary Strong Shock and Magnetic Cloud and its Consequent Geoeffectiveness

Numerical studies have been performed to interpret the observed "shock overtaking magnetic cloud (MC)" event by a 2.5 dimensional magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model in heliospheric meridional plane. Results of an individual MC simulation show that the MC travels with a constant bulk flow speed. The MC is injected with very strong inherent magnetic field over that in the ambient flow and expands rapidly in size initially. Consequently, the diameter of MC increases in an asymptotic speed while its angular width contracts gradually. Meanwhile, simulations of MC-shock interaction are also presented, in which both a typical MC and a strong fast shock emerge from the inner boundary and propagate along heliospheric equator, separated by an appropriate interval. The results show that the shock firstly catches up with the preceding MC, then penetrates through the MC, and finally merges with the MC-driven shock into a stronger compound shock. The morphologies of shock front in interplanetary space and MC body behave as a central concave and a smooth arc respectively. The compression and rotation of magnetic field serve as an efficient mechanism to cause a large geomagnetic storm. The MC is highly compressed by the the overtaking shock. Contrarily, the transport time of incidental shock influenced by the MC depends on the interval between their commencements. Maximum geoeffectiveness results from that when the shock enters the core of preceding MC, which is also substantiated to some extent by a corresponding simplified analytic model. Quantified by $Dst$ index, the specific result gives that the geoeffectiveness of an individual MC is largely enhanced with 80% increment in maximum by an incidental shock.

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2009

Magnetohydrodynamic Simulation of the Interaction between Interplanetary Strong Shock and Magnetic Cloud and its Consequent Geoeffectiveness 2: Oblique Collision

Numerical studies of the interplanetary "shock overtaking magnetic cloud (MC)" event are continued by a 2.5 dimensional magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model in heliospheric meridional plane. Interplanetary direct collision (DC)/oblique collision (OC) between an MC and a shock results from their same/different initial propagation orientations. For radially erupted MC and shock in solar corona, the orientations are only determined respectively by their heliographic locations. OC is investigated in contrast with the results in DC \citep{Xiong2006}. The shock front behaves as a smooth arc. The cannibalized part of MC is highly compressed by the shock front along its normal. As the shock propagates gradually into the preceding MC body, the most violent interaction is transferred sideways with an accompanying significant narrowing of the MC's angular width. The opposite deflections of MC body and shock aphelion in OC occur simultaneously through the process of the shock penetrating the MC. After the shock's passage, the MC is restored to its oblate morphology. With the decrease of MC-shock commencement interval, the shock front at 1 AU traverses MC body and is responsible for the same change trend of the latitude of the greatest geoeffectiveness of MC-shock compound. Regardless of shock orientation, shock penetration location regarding the maximum geoeffectiveness is right at MC core on the condition of very strong shock intensity. An appropriate angular difference between the initial eruption of an MC and an overtaking shock leads to the maximum deflection of the MC body. The larger the shock intensity is, the greater is the deflection angle. The interaction of MCs with other disturbances could be a cause of deflected propagation of interplanetary coronal mass ejection (ICME).

astro-ph.SR↗

arXiv2009

Magnetohydrodynamic simulation of the interaction between two interplanetary magnetic clouds and its consequent geoeffectiveness

Numerical studies of the interplanetary "multiple magnetic clouds (Multi-MC)" are performed by a 2.5-dimensional ideal magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) model in the heliospheric meridional plane. Both slow MC1 and fast MC2 are initially emerged along the heliospheric equator, one after another with different time interval. The coupling of two MCs could be considered as the comprehensive interaction between two systems, each comprising of an MC body and its driven shock. The MC2-driven shock and MC2 body are successively involved into interaction with MC1 body. The momentum is transferred from MC2 to MC1. After the passage of MC2-driven shock front, magnetic field lines in MC1 medium previously compressed by MC2-driven shock are prevented from being restored by the MC2 body pushing. MC1 body undergoes the most violent compression from the ambient solar wind ahead, continuous penetration of MC2-driven shock through MC1 body, and persistent pushing of MC2 body at MC1 tail boundary. As the evolution proceeds, the MC1 body suffers from larger and larger compression, and its original vulnerable magnetic elasticity becomes stiffer and stiffer. So there exists a maximum compressibility of Multi-MC when the accumulated elasticity can balance the external compression. With respect to Multi-MC geoeffectiveness, the evolution stage is a dominant factor, whereas the collision intensity is a subordinate one. The magnetic elasticity, magnetic helicity of each MC, and compression between each other are the key physical factors for the formation, propagation, evolution, and resulting geoeffectiveness of interplanetary Multi-MC.

physics.space-ph↗

arXiv2008

A Comparative Study Between Eruptive X-class Flares Associated with Coronal Mass Ejections and Confined X-class Flares

We examine the two kinds of major energetic phenomena that occur in the solar atmosphere: eruptive and confined events. The former describes flares with associated coronal mass ejections (CMEs), while the latter denotes flares without associated CMEs. We find that about 90% of X-class flares are eruptive, but the remaining 10% are confined. To probe why the largest energy releases could be either eruptive or confined, we investigate four X-class events from each of the two types. Both sets of events are selected to have very similar intensities (X1.0 to X3.6) and duration (rise time under 13 minutes and decay time not over 9 minutes) in soft X-ray observations, to reduce any bias due to flare size on CME occurrence. We find that the occurrence of eruption (or confinement) is sensitive to the displacement of the location of the energy release, defined as the distance between the flare site and the flux-weighted magnetic center of the source active region. The displacement is 6 - 17 Mm for confined events but as large as 22 - 37 Mm for eruptive events. This means that confined events occur closer to the magnetic center, while the eruptive events tend to occur close to the edge of active regions. We use the potential field source-surface model to infer the coronal magnetic field above the source active regions and calculate the flux ratio of low (<1.1 Rs) to high (>1.1 Rs) corona. We find that the confined events have a lower ratio (<5.7) than the eruptive events (>7.1). These results imply that a stronger overlying arcade field may prevent energy releases in the low corona from being eruptive, resulting in flares, but without CMEs.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2008

Strength of Coronal Mass Ejection-Driven Shocks Near the Sun, and Its Importance in Predicting Solar Energetic Particle Events

Coronal shocks are important structures, but there are no direct observations of them in solar and space physics. The strength of shocks plays a key role in shock-related phenomena, such as radio bursts and solar energetic particle (SEP) generation. This paper presents an improved method of calculating Alfven speed and shock strength near the Sun. This method is based on using as many observations as possible, rather than one-dimensional global models. Two events, a relatively slow CME on 2001 September 15 and a very fast CME on 2000 June 15, are selected to illustrate the calculation process. The calculation results suggest that the slow CME drove a strong shock, with Mach number of 3.43 - 4.18, while the fast CME drove a relatively weak shock, with Mach number of 1.90 - 3.21. This is consistent with the radio observations, which find a stronger and longer decameter-hectometric (DH) type II radio burst during the first event, and a short DH type II radio burst during the second event. In particular, the alculation results explain the observational fact that the slow CME produced a major solar energetic particle (SEP) event, while the fast CME did not. Through a comparison of the two events, the importance of shock strength in predicting SEP events is addressed.

astro-ph↗

arXiv2008

A Statistical Study on Solar Active Regions Producing Extremely Fast Coronal Mass Ejections

We present a statistical result on the properties of solar source regions that have produced 57 fastest front-side coronal mass ejections (CMEs) (speed 1500 km/s) occurred from 1996 June to 2007 January. The properties of these fast-CME-producing regions, 35 in total, are compared with those of all 1143 active regions (ARs) in the period studied. An automated method, based on SOHO/MDI magnetic synoptic charts, is used to select and characterize the ARs. For each AR, a set of parameters are derived including the areas (positive, negative and total, denoted by A_P, A_N and A_T respectively), the magnetic fluxes (positive, negative and total, F_P, F_N and F_T respectively), the average magnetic field strength (B_avg), quasi-elongation (e) characterizing the overall shape of the AR, the number and length of polarity inversion lines (PILs, or neutral lines, N_PIL and L_PIL respectively), and the average and maximum of magnetic gradient on the PILs (GOP_avg and GOP_max respectively). Our statistical analysis shows a general trend between the scales of an AR and the likelihood of producing a fast CME, i.e., the larger the geometric size (A_T), the larger the magnetic flux (F_T), the stronger the magnetic field (B_avg), and/or the more complex the magnetic configuration (N_PIL and L_PIL), then the higher the possibility of producing a fast CME. When all ARs are sorted into three equally-numbered groups with low, middle and high values of these parameters, we find that, for all these AR parameters, more than 60% of extremely fast CMEs are from the high-value group. The two PIL parameters are the best indicators of producing fast CMEs, with more than 80% from the high value group.

astro-ph↗