No Arabic abstract
We present a detailed study of the formation of an inverse S-shaped filament prior to its eruption in active region NOAA 11884 from October 31 to November 2, 2013. In the initial stage, clockwise rotation of a small positive sunspot around the main negative trailing sunspot formed a curved filament. Then the small sunspot cancelled with negative magnetic flux to create a longer active-region filament with an inverse S-shape. At the cancellation site a brightening was observed in UV and EUV images and bright material was transferred to the filament. Later the filament erupted after cancellation of two opposite polarities under the upper part of the filament. Nonlinear force-free field (NLFFF) extrapolation of vector photospheric fields suggests that the filament may have a twisted structure, but this cannot be confirmed from the current observations.
We present a formation process of a filament in active region NOAA 12574 during the period from 2016 August 11 to 12. Combining the observations of GONG H$alpha$, Hida spectrum and SDO/AIA 304 A, the formation process of the filament is studied. It is found that cool material ($Tsim10^4$ K) is ejected by a series of jets originating from the western foot-point of the filament. Simultaneously, the magnetic flux emerged from the photosphere in the vicinity of the western foot-point of the filament. These observations suggest that cool material in the low atmosphere can be directly injected into the upper atmosphere and the jets are triggered by the magnetic reconnection between pre-existing magnetic fields and new emerging magnetic fields. Detailed study of a jet at 18:02 UT on August 11 with GST/BBSO TiO observations reveals that some dark threads appeared in the vicinity of the western foot-point after the jet and the projection velocity of plasma along the filament axis was about 162.6$pm$5.4 km/s. Using with DST/Hida observations, we find that the injected plasma by a jet at 00:42 UT on August 12 was rotating. Therefore, we conclude that the jets not only supplied the material for the filament, but also injected the helicity into the filament simultaneously. Comparing the quantity of mass injection by the jets with the mass of the filament, we conclude that the estimated mass loading by the jets is sufficient to account for the mass in the filament.
Several scenarios explaining how filaments are formed can be found in literature. In this paper, we analyzed the observations of an active region filament and critically evaluated the observed properties in the context of current filament formation models. This study is based on multi-height spectropolarimetric observations. The inferred vector magnetic field has been extrapolated starting either from the photosphere or from the chromosphere. The line-of-sight motions of the filament, which was located near disk center, have been analyzed inferring the Doppler velocities. We conclude that a part of the magnetic structure emerged from below the photosphere.
In solar filament formation mechanisms, magnetic reconnection between two sets of sheared arcades forms helical structures of the filament with numerous magnetic dips, and cooling and condensation of plasma trapped inside the helical structures supply mass to the filament. Although each of these processes, namely, magnetic reconnection and coronal condensation have been separately reported, observations that show the whole process of filament formation are rare. In this Letter, we present the formation of a sigmoid via reconnection between two sets of coronal loops, and the subsequent formation of a filament through cooling and condensation of plasma inside the newly formed sigmoid. On 2014 August 27, a set of loops in the active region 12151 reconnected with another set of loops that are located to the east. A longer twisted sigmoidal structure and a set of shorter lower-lying loops then formed. The observations coincide well with the tether-cutting model. The newly formed sigmoid remains stable and does not erupt as a coronal mass ejection. From the eastern endpoint, signatures of injection of material into the sigmoid (as brightenings) are detected, which closely outline the features of increasing emission measure at these locations. This may indicate the chromospheric evaporation caused by reconnection, supplying heated plasma into the sigmoid. In the sigmoid, thermal instability occurs, and rapid cooling and condensation of plasma take place, forming a filament. The condensations then flow bi-directionally to the filament endpoints. Our results provide a clear observational evidence of the filament formation via magnetic reconnection and coronal condensation.
Coronal loops are building blocks of solar active regions. However, their formation mechanism is still not well understood. Here we present direct observational evidence for the formation of coronal loops through magnetic reconnection as new magnetic fluxes emerge into the solar atmosphere. Extreme-ultraviolet observations of the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) clearly show the newly formed loops following magnetic reconnection within a plasma sheet. Formation of the loops is also seen in the h{alpha} line-core images taken by the New Vacuum Solar Telescope. Observations from the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager onboard SDO show that a positive-polarity flux concentration moves towards a negative-polarity one with a speed of ~0.4 km/s, before the formation of coronal loops. During the loop formation process, we found signatures of flux cancellation and subsequent enhancement of the transverse field between the two polarities. The three-dimensional magnetic field structure reconstructed through a magnetohydrostatic model shows field lines consistent with the loops in AIA images. Numerous bright blobs with an average width of 1.37 Mm appear intermittently in the plasma sheet and move upward with a projected velocity of ~114 km/s. The temperature, emission measure and density of these blobs are about 3 MK, 2.0x10^(28) cm^(-5) and 1.2x10^(10) cm^(-3), respectively. A power spectral analysis of these blobs indicates that the observed reconnection is likely not dominated by a turbulent process. We have also identified flows with a velocity of 20 to 50 km/s towards the footpoints of the newly formed coronal loops.
Flux ropes are generally believed to be core structures of solar eruptions that are significant for the space weather, but their formation mechanism remains intensely debated. We report on the formation of a tiny flux rope beneath clusters of active region loops on 2018 August 24. Combining the high-quality multiwavelength observations from multiple instruments, we studied the event in detail in the photosphere, chromosphere, and corona. In the source region, the continual emergence of two positive polarities (P1 and P2) that appeared as two pores (A and B)is unambiguous. Interestingly, P2 and Pore B slowly approached P1 and Pore A, implying a magnetic flux convergence. During the emergence and convergence, P1 and P2 successively interacted with a minor negative polarity (N3) that emerged, which led to a continuous magnetic flux cancellation. As a result, the overlying loops became much sheared and finally evolved into a tiny twisted flux rope that was evidenced by a transient inverse S-shaped sigmoid, the twisted filament threads with blueshift and redshift signatures, and a hot channel. All the results show that the formation of the tiny flux rope in the center of the active region was closely associated with the continuous magnetic flux emergence, convergence, and cancellation in the photosphere. Hence, we suggest that the magnetic flux emergence, convergence, and cancellation are crucial for the formation of the tiny flux rope.