J/ApJ/737/L35 Pulsed Alfven waves in the solar wind (Gosling+, 2011)
Pulsed Alfven waves in the solar wind.
Gosling J.T., Tian H., Phan T.D.
<Astrophys. J., 737, L35 (2011)>
=2011ApJ...737L..35G 2011ApJ...737L..35G
ADC_Keywords: Sun ; Magnetic fields
Keywords: magnetic fields - plasmas - solar wind - turbulence - waves
Abstract:
Using 3s plasma and magnetic field data from the Wind spacecraft
located in the solar wind well upstream from Earth, we report
observations of isolated, pulse-like Alfvenic disturbances in the
solar wind. These isolated events are characterized by roughly
plane-polarized rotations in the solar wind magnetic field and
velocity vectors away from the directions of the underlying field and
velocity and then back again. They pass over Wind on timescales
ranging from seconds to several minutes. These isolated, pulsed Alfven
waves are pervasive; we have identified 175 such events over the full
range of solar wind speeds (320-550km/s) observed in a randomly chosen
10 day interval.
File Summary:
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FileName Lrecl Records Explanations
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ReadMe 80 . This file
table1.dat 55 175 Pulsed Alfven wave characteristics and analysis
results (from Erratum: 2012, ApJ, 751, L22)
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See also:
J/A+A/539/A13 : Solar bipolar magnetic fields (Yamamoto, 2012)
J/A+A/509/A14 : Grid of solar-metallicity wind models (Mattsson+, 2010)
J/ApJS/183/225 : A catalog of coronal "EIT wave" transients (Thompson+, 2009)
J/ApJS/169/439 : Models of solar magnetic structures (Socas-Navarro, 2007)
http://cdaweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/ : NASA Space Physics Data Facility - CDAWeb
Byte-by-byte Description of file: table1.dat
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Bytes Format Units Label Explanations
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1- 2 I2 d Day [1/10] Day June 2007
4- 13 A10 "h:m:s" Time Wave start time
15- 17 I3 s D [9/207] Duration of wave
19- 21 I3 km/s V Solar wind speed at wave onset
23- 28 F6.3 --- DB/B0 Maximum fractional change in field magnitude (1)
30- 34 F5.1 deg alpha Maximum field rotation angle α (2)
36- 41 F6.3 --- DN/N0 Maximum fractional change in proton density (3)
43- 48 F6.3 --- DT/T0 Maximum fractional change in proton
temperature (4)
50- 53 F4.2 --- Slope Degree of Alfvenicity of the wave
55 A1 --- DWP [AT] Direction of wave propagation (5)
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Note (1): Relative to average orientation prior to wave.
Note (2): Away from the average initial field orientation.
Note (3): Relative to average proton density prior to wave.
Note (4): Relative to average proton temperature prior to wave.
Note (5): Away from (A) or toward (T) the Sun in the solar wind rest frame.
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History:
From electronic version of the journal
(End) Greg Schwarz [AAS], Emmanuelle Perret [CDS] 11-Jan-2013