Torsional oscillations within a magnetic pore in the solar photosphere

TY - JOUR

T1 - Torsional oscillations within a magnetic pore in the solar photosphere

AU - Stangalini, Marco

AU - Erdélyi, Robertus

AU - Boocock, Callum

AU - Tsiklauri, David

AU - Nelson, Christopher J.

AU - Del Moro, Dario

AU - Berrilli, Francesco

AU - Korsós, Marianna B.

N1 - Funding Information: R.E. and M.B.K. are grateful to the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) (UK, grant number ST/M000826/1 and ST/S000518/1). R.E., M.B.K., F.B. and D.D.M. acknowledge support from EU H2020 (SOLARNET grant number 158538). R.E. also acknowledges support from the Chinese Academy of Sciences President’s International Fellowship Initiative (PIFI, grant number 2019VMA0052) and The Royal Society (grant number IE161153). M.S. thanks the Solar Physics and Space Plasma Research Centre (SP2RC), School of Mathematics and Statistics (SoMaS), The University of Sheffield, for the warm hospitality and support received as an MSRC Visiting Research Fellow while carrying out part of this research. M.S. and C.B. acknowledge scientific discussions at the Theo Murphy Discussion Meeting ‘High-resolution wave dynamics in the lower solar atmosphere’, supported by The Royal Society. C.B. would like to thank UK STFC DISCnet for financial support of his PhD studentship. This research utilized Queen Mary’s Apocrita HPC facility, supported by QMUL Research-IT. C.J.N. is grateful to the STFC for the support received to conduct this research through grant number ST/P000304/1. We thank G. Verth for some initial discussions. This research made use of SciPy, NumPy and Matplotlib, community-developed Python packages. Publisher Copyright: © 2021, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.

PY - 2021/7/1

Y1 - 2021/7/1

N2 - Alfvén waves have proven to be important in a range of physical systems due to their ability to transport non-thermal energy over long distances in a magnetized plasma. This property is of specific interest in solar physics, where the extreme heating of the atmosphere of the Sun remains unexplained. In an inhomogeneous plasma such as a flux tube in the solar atmosphere, they manifest as incompressible torsional perturbations. However, despite evidence in the upper atmosphere, they have not been directly observed in the photosphere. Here, we report the detection of antiphase incompressible torsional oscillations observed in a magnetic pore in the photosphere by the Interferometric Bidimensional Spectropolarimeter. State-of-the-art numerical simulations suggest that a kink mode is a possible excitation mechanism of these waves. The excitation of torsional waves in photospheric magnetic structures can substantially contribute to the energy transport in the solar atmosphere and the acceleration of the solar wind, especially if such signatures will be ubiquitously detected in even smaller structures with the forthcoming next generation of solar telescopes.

AB - Alfvén waves have proven to be important in a range of physical systems due to their ability to transport non-thermal energy over long distances in a magnetized plasma. This property is of specific interest in solar physics, where the extreme heating of the atmosphere of the Sun remains unexplained. In an inhomogeneous plasma such as a flux tube in the solar atmosphere, they manifest as incompressible torsional perturbations. However, despite evidence in the upper atmosphere, they have not been directly observed in the photosphere. Here, we report the detection of antiphase incompressible torsional oscillations observed in a magnetic pore in the photosphere by the Interferometric Bidimensional Spectropolarimeter. State-of-the-art numerical simulations suggest that a kink mode is a possible excitation mechanism of these waves. The excitation of torsional waves in photospheric magnetic structures can substantially contribute to the energy transport in the solar atmosphere and the acceleration of the solar wind, especially if such signatures will be ubiquitously detected in even smaller structures with the forthcoming next generation of solar telescopes.

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85105471742&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1038/s41550-021-01354-8

DO - 10.1038/s41550-021-01354-8

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85105471742

VL - 5

SP - 691

EP - 696

JO - Nature Astronomy

JF - Nature Astronomy

SN - 2397-3366

IS - 7

ER -