We present RHESSI and TRACE observations of multiple flare activity that occurred in the active region NOAA 10656 over the period of two hours on 2004 August 18. Out of four successive flares, there were three events of class C while the final event
was a major X1.8 solar eruptive flare. The events during the pre-eruption phase, i.e., before the X1.8 flare, are characterized by localized episodes of energy release occurring in the vicinity of an active region filament which produced intense heating along with non-thermal emission. A few minutes before the eruption, the filament undergoes an activation phase during which it slowly rises with a speed of ~12 km/s. The filament eruption is accompanied with an X1.8 flare during which multiple HXR bursts are observed up to 100-300 keV energies. We observe a bright and elongated coronal structure simultaneously in E(UV) and 50-100 keV HXR images underneath the expanding filament during the period of HXR bursts which provides strong evidence for ongoing magnetic reconnection. This phase is accompanied with very high plasma temperatures of ~31 MK and followed by the detachment of the prominence from the solar source region. From the location, timing, strength, and spectrum of HXR emission, we conclude that the prominence eruption is driven by the distinct events of magnetic reconnection occurring in a current sheet formed below the erupting filament. These multi-wavelength observations also suggest that the localized magnetic reconnections associated with different evolutionary stages of the filament in the pre-eruption phase play a crucial role in destabilizing the filament by a tether-cutting process leading to large-scale eruption and X-class flare.
In this article, we review some key aspects of a multi-wavelength flare which have essentially contributed to form a standard flare model based on the magnetic reconnection. The emphasis is given on the recent observations taken by the Reuven Ramaty
High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI) on the X-ray emission originating from different regions of the coronal loops. We also briefly summarize those observations which do not seem to accommodate within the canonical flare picture and discuss the challenges for future investigations.
In this paper, we present a multi-wavelength analysis of an eruptive white-light M3.2 flare which occurred in active region NOAA 10486 on November 1, 2003. Excellent set of high resolution observations made by RHESSI and TRACE provide clear evidence
of significant pre-flare activities for ~9 minutes in the form of an initiation phase observed at EUV/UV wavelengths followed by the X-ray precursor phase. During the initiation phase, we observed localized brightenings in the highly sheared core region close to the filament and interactions among short EUV loops overlying the filament which led to the opening of magnetic field lines. The X-ray precursor phase is manifested in RHESSI measurements below ~30 keV and coincided with the beginning of flux emergence at the flaring location along with early signatures of the eruption. From the RHESSI observations, we conclude that both plasma heating and electron acceleration occurred during the precursor phase. The main flare is consistent with the standard flare model. However, after the impulsive phase, intense HXR looptop source was observed without significant footpoint emission. More intriguingly, for a brief period the looptop source exhibited strong HXR emission with energies up to 100 keV and significant non-thermal characteristics. The present study indicates a causal relation between the activities in the preflare and main flare. We also conclude that pre-flare activities, occurred in the form of subtle magnetic reorganization along with localized magnetic reconnection, played a crucial role in destabilizing the active region filament leading to solar eruptive flare and associated large-scale phenomena.
We present a detailed multi-wavelength analysis and interpretation of the evolution of an M7.6 flare on October 24, 2003. The X-ray observations of the flare taken from the RHESSI spacecraft reveal two phases of the flare evolution. The first phase i
s characterized by the altitude decrease of the X-ray looptop (LT) source for $sim$11 minutes. Such a long duration of the descending LT source motion is reported for the first time. The EUV loops, located below the X-ray LT source, also undergo contraction with similar speed ($sim$15 km s$^{-1}$) in this interval. During the second phase the two distinct hard X-ray footpoints (FP) sources are observed which correlate well with UV and H$alpha$ flare ribbons. The X-ray LT source now exhibits upward motion. The RHESSI spectra during the first phase are soft and indicative of hot thermal emission from flaring loops with temperatures $T>25$ MK at the early stage. On the other hand, the spectra at high energies ($varepsilon gtrsim$25 keV) follow hard power laws during the second phase ($gamma = 2.6-2.8$). We show that the observed motion of the LT and FP sources can be understood as a consequence of three-dimensional magnetic reconnection at a separator in the corona. During the first phase of the flare, the reconnection releases an excess of magnetic energy related to the magnetic tensions generated before a flare by the shear flows in the photosphere. The relaxation of the associated magnetic shear in the corona by the reconnection process explains the descending motion of the LT source. During the second phase, the ordinary reconnection process dominates describing the energy release in terms of the standard model of large eruptive flares.
The data of sunspot numbers, sunspot areas and solar flare index during cycle 23 are analyzed to investigate the intermediate-term periodicities. Power spectral analysis has been performed separately for the data of the whole disk, northern and south
ern hemispheres of the Sun. Several significant midrange periodicities ($sim$175, 133, 113, 104, 84, 63 days) are detected in sunspot activity. Most of the periodicities in sunspot numbers generally agree with those of sunspot areas during the solar cycle 23. The study reveals that the periodic variations in the northern and southern hemispheres of the Sun show a kind of asymmetrical behavior. Periodicities of $sim$175 days and $sim$133 days are highly significant in the sunspot data of northern hemisphere showing consistency with the findings of Lean (1990) during solar cycles 12-21. On the other hand, southern hemisphere shows a strong periodicity of about 85 days in terms of sunspot activity. The analysis of solar flare index data of the same time interval does not show any significant peak. The different periodic behavior of sunspot and flare activity can be understood in the light of hypothesis proposed by Ballester et al. (2002), which suggests that during cycle 23, the periodic emergence of magnetic flux partly takes place away from developed sunspot groups and hence may not necessarily increase the magnetic complexity of sunspot groups that leads to the generation of flares.
