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Mechanisms for Flash Phase Phenomena in Solar Flares

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 May 2016

Dean F. Smith
Dean F. Smith*
Affiliation:
High Altitude Observatory, National Center for Atmospheric Research*, Boulder, Colo., U.S.A.

Abstract

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Mechanisms for explaining the various forms of particles and radiation observed during the flash phase of solar flares are reviewed under the working hypothesis that the flash phase is the time in which electrons and to a lesser degree protons are accelerated in less than one second. A succession of such accelerations is allowed to explain longer lasting or quasi-periodic phenomena. Mechanisms capable of such acceleration are reviewed and it is concluded that first-order Fermi acceleration in a reconnecting current sheet is the most likely basic process. Such acceleration, however, gives rise to a rather narrow distribution of particle velocities along a given field line which is unstable to the production of electron plasma and ion-acoustic waves. This plasma turbulence can heat the plasma to produce soft X-rays and filter the initially narrow velocity distribution to produce a power law energy distribution. Electrons travelling inward from the acceleration region produce hard X-rays by bremsstrahlung and microwave bursts by gyro-synchrotron emission. Whereas the interpretation of X-ray spectra is relatively straightforward, the interpretation of microwave spectra is difficult because the source at low frequencies can be made optically thick by several different mechanisms.

Electrons travelling further inward presumably thermalize and produce impulsive EUV and Hα emission. The theory for these emissions, although amenable to present techniques in radiative transfer, has not been worked out. Electrons travelling outward give rise to type III radio bursts by excitation of electron plasma waves and the electrons observed at the Earth. Study of the interaction of a stream of electrons with the ambient plasma shows that the electron spectra observed at the Earth do not necessarily reflect their spectrum at the acceleration region since they interact via plasma waves as well as through Coulomb collisions. The mechanisms for the conversion of plasma waves into radiation and the propagation of the radiation from its source to the observer are reviewed.

Type
Part II The Flash Phase of Solar Flares
Information
Symposium - International Astronomical Union , Volume 57: Coronal Disturbances , 1974 , pp. 253 - 282
Copyright
Copyright © Reidel 1974 

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