Solar cycle according to mean magnetic field data

On Predicting the Solar Cycle using Mean-Field Models

We discuss the difficulties of predicting the solar cycle using mean-field models. Here we argue that these difficulties arise owing to the significant modulation of the solar activity cycle, and that this modulation arises owing to either stochastic or deterministic processes. We analyse the implications for predictability in both of these situations by considering two separate solar dynamo mo...

Reconstruction of Solar Coronal Linear Force-Free Magnetic Field

Improvement of Solar Magnetic Field Data for Space Weather Applications

We have three primary scientific objectives for this project: (1) to continue to improve the accuracy and utility of archival and current solar magnetic field data that are used to help understand and predict space weather; (2) to develop ways of utilizing the significantly improved data to be provided by the SOLIS instruments starting in 2002; and (3) To investigate the predictive potential of...

Meridional Circulation and the Solar Magnetic Cycle

The Sun’s magnetic cycle manifests itself in an year periodic variation in the number of sunspots seen on the solar surface and a periodic reversal in the polarity of its large-scale magnetic fields. Exploring the origins of this magnetic cycle can unravel the physical mechanisms at work in the interior of magnetized stars like the Sun. Such studies are also important for understanding how the ...

Deciphering Solar Magnetic Activity: Spotting Solar Cycle 25

We present observational signatures of solar cycle 25 onset. Those signatures are visibly following a migratory path from high to low latitudes. They had starting points that are asymmetrically offset in each hemisphere at times that are 21–22 years after the corresponding, same polarity, activity bands of solar cycle 23 started their migration. Those bands define the so-called “extended solar ...