• 천문학회지
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• 제36권spc1호
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• pp.63-73
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• 2003

Solar flares present a number of radiative characteristics indicative of kinetic processes of high energy particles. Proper understanding of the kinetic processes, however, relies on how well we can separate the acceleration from transport characteristics. In this paper, we discuss microwave and hard X-ray bursts as a powerful tool in investigating the acceleration and transport of high energy electrons. After a brief review of the studies devoted to the kinetic process of solar flare particles, we cast them into a simple formulation which allows us to handle the injection, trap, and precipitation of flare electrons self-consistently. The formulation is then taken as a basis for interpreting and analyzing a set of impulsive and gradual bursts occurred on 2001 April 6 observed with the Owens Valley Solar Array, and HXT/WBS onboard Yohkoh satellite. We quantify the acceleration, trap, and precipitation processes during each burst in terms of relevant time scales, and also determine ambient density and magnetic field. Our result suggests that it should be the acceleration property, in particular, electron pitch angle distribution, rather than the trap condition, that is mainly responsible for the distinctive properties of the impulsive and gradual flares.

• 천문학회보
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• 제35권2호
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• pp.50.1-50.1
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• 2010

The New Solar Telescope (NST) at Big Bear Solar Observatory (BBSO) is the recently constructed world largest 1.6 m optical solar telescope on the ground. We took an observation of the north polar limb in H-alpha line center wavelength on 2009 August 26 with the instrument at Nasmyth focus of the NST and found a remarkable small-scale H-alpha eruption from 18:20 UT and 18:45 UT. The eruption occurred with a relatively slow speed of about 10 km/s in early stage and a slight acceleration up to 20-30 km/s in later stage. We also found that the eruption shows a deflection along the pre-existing magnetic field as well as several interesting features such as bifurcation, rotation, horizontal oscillation, and direction and thickness change of its structure during the eruption. In this talk, we will report the observational properties of the small-scale eruption observed by the NST and discuss their implication on magnetic reconnection.

• 천문학회보
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• 제41권1호
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• pp.46.1-46.1
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• 2016

The formation process of a current sheet is important for solar flare from a viewpoint of a space weather prediction. We therefore derive the temporal development of the spatial and statistical distribution of electric current density distributed in a flare-producing active region to describe the formation of a current sheet. We derive time sequence distribution of electric current density by applying a nonlinear force-free approximation reconstruction to Active Region 12158 that produces an X1.6-class flare. The time sequence maps of photospheric vector magnetic field used for reconstruction are captured by a Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) onboard Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO) on 10th September, 2014. The spatial distribution of electric current density in NLFFF model well reproduce observed sigmoidal structure at the preflare phase, although a layer of high current density shrinks at the postflare phase. A double power-law profile of electric current density is found in statistical analysis. This may be expected to use an indicator of the occurrence of a solar flare.

• 천문학논총
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• 제14권2호
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• pp.103-112
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• 1999

We have investigated the solar activity variation with period shorter than 1000 days, through Fourier transformation of solar cycle 21 and 22 data. And real time predictions of the flare maximum intensity have been made by multilinear regression method to allow the use of multivariate vectors of sunspot groups or active region characteristics. In addition, we have examined the evolution of magnetic field and current density in active regions at times before and after flare occurrence, to check short term variability of solar activity. According to our results of calculation, solar activity changes with periods of 27.1, 28.0, 52.1, 156.3, 333.3 days for solar cycle 21 and of 26.5, 27.1, 28.9, 54.1, 154, 176.7, 384.6 days for solar cycle 22. Periodic components of about 27, 28, 53, 155 days are found simultaneously at all of two solar cycles. Finally, from our intensive analysis of solar activity data for three different terms of $1977\~1982,\; 1975\~1998,\;and\;1978\~1982$, we find out that our predictions coincide with observations at hit rate of $76\%,\;63\%$, 59 respectively.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• 제27권3호
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• pp.205-212
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• 2010

To better understand the physical processes that maintain the high-latitude lower thermospheric dynamics, we have identified relative contributions of the momentum forcing and the heating to the high-latitude lower thermospheric winds depending on the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) and altitude. For this study, we performed a term analysis of the potential vorticity equation for the high-latitude neutral wind field in the lower thermosphere during the southern summertime for different IMF conditions, with the aid of the National Center for Atmospheric Research Thermosphere-Ionosphere Electrodynamics General Circulation Model (NCAR-TIEGCM). Difference potential vorticity forcing and heating terms, obtained by subtracting values with zero IMF from those with non-zero IMF, are influenced by the IMF conditions. The difference forcing is more significant for strong IMF $B_y$ condition than for strong IMF $B_z$ condition. For negative or positive $B_y$ conditions, the difference forcings in the polar cap are larger by a factor of about 2 than those in the auroral region. The difference heating is the most significant for negative IMF $B_z$ condition, and the difference heatings in the auroral region are larger by a factor of about 1.5 than those in the polar cap region. The magnitudes of the difference forcing and heating decrease rapidly with descending altitudes. It is confirmed that the contribution of the forcing to the high-latitude lower thermospheric dynamics is stronger than the contribution of the heating to it. Especially, it is obvious that the contribution of the forcing to the dynamics is much larger in the polar cap region than in the auroral region and at higher altitude than at lower altitude. It is evident that when $B_z$ is negative condition the contribution of the forcing is the lowest and the contribution of the heating is the highest among the different IMF conditions.

• 천문학회지
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• 제29권1호
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• pp.9-18
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• 1996

We have analyzed vector magnetograms and $H\beta$ filtergrams of two sunspot groups, one in a growing phase and the other in a decaying phase. In this study, the temporal evolution of their magnetic morphology has been investigated in association with solar activity. The morphological variations of the growing and decaying phase of these sunspots revealed in detail the coalescence of small spots into a large spot and the fragmentation of a large spot into many small spots, respectively. Numerous small flares were detected in the spot group during the decaying phase. This seems to be intimately associated with the shearing motions of many spots with different polarities created by fragmentation of a large sunspot. The magnetic flux and the average shear angle are found to be substantially reduced during the decaying phase, especially in the course of the flarings. This implies that the decaying phase of the sunspot is, to some degree, involved with magnetic field cancellation. The growing spot group has not shown any large activities, but numerous small spots have grown into a typical bipolar sunspot.

• 천문학회보
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• 제40권1호
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• pp.86.3-86.3
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• 2015

There could be significant numbers of isolated stellar mass black holes in our Galaxy. The detection of these black holes will provide important clues on the origin of supermassive black holes. Interstellar gas will be accreted to these isolated black holes in nearly spherical flow. The gas and the interstellar magnetic field will be compressed and emit bremsstrahlung and magnetic bremsstrahlung. We calculate the density, temperature, magnetic field of the accretion flow onto a 10 solar mass black hole as well as its radiative emission; special attention is given to cyclotron radiation and synchrotron radiation, which covers from microwave to X-ray. We consider the possibility to detect these radiation from isolated Galactic black holes with current instruments and surveys.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• 제27권4호
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• pp.319-327
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• 2010

We examine the ionospheric F2-layer electron density variation by solar activity in middle latitude by using foF2 observed at the Kokubunji ionosonde station in Japan for the period from 1997 to 2008. The semi-annual variation of foF2 shows obviously in high solar activity (2000-2002) than low solar activity (2006-2008). It seems that variation of geomagnetic activity by solar activity influences on the semi-annual variation of the ionospheric F2-layer electron density. According to the Lomb-Scargle periodogram analysis of foF2 and Ap index, interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) Bs (IMF Bz <0) component, solar wind speed, solar wind number density and flow pressure which influence the geomagnetic activity, we examine how the geomagnetic activity affects the ionospheric F2-layer electron density variation. We find that the semi-annual variation of daily foF2, Ap index and IMF Bs appear clearly during the high solar activity. It suggests that the semi-annual variation of geomagnetic activity, caused by Russell-McPherron effect, contributes greatly to the ionospheric F2-layer semi-annual electron density variation, except dynamical effects in the thermosphere.

• 천문학회보
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• 제42권1호
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• pp.41.1-41.1
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• 2017

It is well known that there are good relations of coronal hole (CH) parameters such as the size, location, and magnetic field strength to the solar wind conditions and the geomagnetic storms. Especially in the minimum phase of solar cycle, CHs in mid- or low-latitude are one of major drivers for geomagnetic storms, since they form corotating interaction regions (CIRs). By adopting the method of Vrsnak et al. (2007), the Space Weather Research Center (SWRC) in Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI) has done daily forecast of solar wind speed and Dst index from 2010. Through years of experience, we realize that the geomagnetic storms caused by CHs have different characteristics from those by CMEs. Thus, we statistically analyze the characteristics and causality of the geomagnetic storms by the CHs rather than the CMEs with dataset obtained during the solar activity was very low. For this, we examine the CH properties, solar wind parameters as well as geomagnetic storm indices. As the first result, we show the different trends of the solar wind parameters and geomagnetic indices depending on the degree of solar activity represented by CH (quiet) or sunspot number (SSN) in the active region (active) and then we evaluate our forecasts using CH information and suggest several ideas to improve forecasting capability.

• Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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• 제34권4호
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• pp.237-244
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• 2017

Magnetic flux ropes, often observed during intervals of interplanetary coronal mass ejections, have long been recognized to be critical in space weather. In this work, we focus on magnetic flux rope structure but on a much smaller scale, and not necessarily related to interplanetary coronal mass ejections. Using near-Earth solar wind advanced composition explorer (ACE) observations from 1998 to 2016, we identified a total of 309 small-scale magnetic flux ropes (SMFRs). We compared the characteristics of identified SMFR events with those of normal magnetic cloud (MC) events available from the existing literature. First, most of the MCs and SMFRs have similar values of accompanying solar wind speed and proton densities. However, the average magnetic field intensity of SMFRs is weaker (~7.4 nT) than that of MCs (~10.6 nT). Also, the average duration time and expansion speed of SMFRs are ~2.5 hr and 2.6 km/s, respectively, both of which are smaller by a factor of ~10 than those of MCs. In addition, we examined the geoeffectiveness of SMFR events by checking their correlation with magnetic storms and substorms. Based on the criteria Sym-H < -50 nT (for identification of storm occurrence) and AL < -200 nT (for identification of substorm occurrence), we found that for 88 SMFR events (corresponding to 28.5 % of the total SMFR events), substorms occurred after the impact of SMFRs, implying a possible triggering of substorms by SMFRs. In contrast, we found only two SMFRs that triggered storms. We emphasize that, based on a much larger database than used in previous studies, all these previously known features are now firmly confirmed by the current work. Accordingly, the results emphasize the significance of SMFRs from the viewpoint of possible triggering of substorms.