Relations Between Microwave Bursts and Near-Earth High-Energy Proton Enhancements and Their Origin

Abstract

We further study the relations between parameters of bursts at 35 GHz recorded with the Nobeyama Radio Polarimeters during 25 years and solar proton events (Grechnev et al. in Publ. Astron. Soc. Japan 65, S4, 2013a). Here we address the relations between the microwave fluences at 35 GHz and near-Earth proton fluences above 100 MeV to find information on their sources and evaluate their diagnostic potential. The correlation between the microwave and proton fluences is pronouncedly higher than between their peak fluxes. This probably reflects a dependence of the total number of protons on the duration of the acceleration process. In events with strong flares, the correlation coefficients of high-energy proton fluences with microwave and soft X-ray fluences are higher than those with the speeds of coronal mass ejections. The results indicate a statistically larger contribution of flare processes to high-energy proton fluxes. Acceleration by shock waves seems to be less important at high energies in events associated with strong flares, although its contribution is probable and possibly prevails in weaker events. The probability of a detectable proton enhancement was found to directly depend on the peak flux, duration, and fluence of the 35 GHz burst, while the role of the Big Flare Syndrome might have been overestimated previously. Empirical diagnostic relations are proposed.