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Determination of the Coronal and Interplanetary Magnetic Field Strength and Radial Profiles from Large-Scale Photospheric Magnetic Fields

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Abstract

We propose a new model for the magnetic field at different distances from the Sun during different phases of the solar cycle. The model depends on the observed large-scale non-polar (\({\pm}\, 55^{\circ }\)) photospheric magnetic field and on the magnetic field measured at polar regions from \(55^{\circ }\) N to \(90^{\circ }\) N and from \(55^{\circ }\) S to \(90^{\circ }\) S, which are the visible manifestations of cyclic changes in the toroidal and poloidal components of the global magnetic field of the Sun. The modeled magnetic field is determined as the superposition of the non-polar and polar photospheric magnetic field and considers cycle variations. The agreement between the model predictions and magnetic fields derived from direct in situ measurements at different distances from the Sun, obtained with different methods and at different solar activity phases, is quite satisfactory. From a comparison of the magnetic fields as observed and calculated from the model at 1 AU, we conclude that the model magnetic field variations adequately explain the main features of the interplanetary magnetic field (IMF) radial, \(B_{\mathrm{x}}\), component cycle evolution at Earth’s orbit. The modeled magnetic field averaged over a Carrington rotation (CR) correlates with the IMF \(B_{\mathrm{x}}\) component also averaged over a CR at Earth’s orbit with a coefficient of 0.691, while for seven CR-averaged data, the correlation reaches 0.81. The radial profiles of the modeled magnetic field are compared with those of already existing models. In contrast to existing models, ours provides realistic magnetic-field radial distributions over a wide range of heliospheric distances at different cycle phases, taking into account the cycle variations of the solar toroidal and poloidal magnetic fields. The model is a good approximation of the cycle behavior of the magnetic field in the heliosphere. In addition, the decrease in the non-polar and polar photospheric magnetic fields is shown. Furthermore, the magnetic field during solar cycle maxima and minima decreased from Cycle 21 to Cycle 24. This implies that both the toroidal and poloidal components, and therefore the solar global magnetic field, decreased from Cycle 21 to Cycle 24.

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Acknowledgements

The author expresses her appreciation to the anonymous referee for a very thorough and helpful revision of the paper.

Wilcox Solar Observatory data used in this study were obtained via the web site http://wso.stanford.edu at 2018:03:11 01:13:34 PST courtesy of J.T. Hoeksema. The Wilcox Solar Observatory is currently supported by NASA.

Data on the IMF were obtained from multi-source OMNI 2 database via the web site https://omniweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/ow.html . The author thanks the GSFC/SPDF and OMNIWeb for the opportunity to use this data.

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  1. Moscow M.V. Lomonosov State University, Sternberg Astronomical Institute, Universitetsky pr. 13, Moscow, 119234, Russia

    Irina A. Bilenko

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Bilenko, I.A. Determination of the Coronal and Interplanetary Magnetic Field Strength and Radial Profiles from Large-Scale Photospheric Magnetic Fields. Sol Phys 293, 106 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11207-018-1324-3

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