Abstract
The Sun is a natural laboratory for plasma processes. A myriad of instruments aboard satellites and on ground record(ed) the plasma emission in different ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum to help understand such processes. In particular, in the outer part of the solar atmosphere, the solar corona, we can observe a multitude of electrodynamical phenomena. There, the faint corona emission and the associated dynamic plasma structures (e.g., coronal mass ejections—CMEs) recorded in white-light images can be used as basis for some insight of this physical scenario. In order to characterize the dynamics and morphology of such structures in a better way, it seems crucial that some features of those images should be enhanced. To deal with this need, a new approach using a complex wavelet transform methodology was developed. With the proposed methodology, we can highlight the plasma ejections improving the identification of those structures.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
J.-P. Antoine, R. Murenzi, P. Vandergheynst, S.T. Ali. Two dimensional wavelets and their relatives (Cambridge, 2008)
G.E. Brueckner, R.A. Howard, M.J. Koomen, C.M. Korendyke, D.J. Michels, J.D. Moses, D.G. Socker, K.P. Dere, P.L. Lamy, A. Llebaria, M.V. Bout, R. Schwenn, G.M. Simnett, D.K. Bedford, C.J Eyles, The large angle spectroscopic coronagraph (LASCO). Sol. Phys. 162, 357–402 (1995)
L. Burlaga, E. Sittler, F. Mariani, R. Schwenn, Magnetic loop behind an interplanetary shock: Voyager, Helios, and IMP 8 observations. J. Geophys. Res. 86(A8), 6673–6684 (1981)
L.F. Burlaga, K.W. Behannon, L.W. Klein, Compound streams, magnetic clouds, and major geomagnetic storms. J. Geophys. Res. 92(A6), 5725–5734 (1987)
J.P. Byrne, P.T. Gallagher, R.T.J. McAteer, C.A Young, The kinematics of coronal mass ejections using multiscale methods. A&A. 495(1), 325–334 (2009)
H. Cremades, V. Bothmer, On the three-dimensional configuration of coronal mass ejections. A&A. 422, 307–322 (2004)
H. Cremades, O.C. St. Cyr, G. Stenborg, Revealing the inside of coronal mass ejections. in SOHO-17. 10 Years of SOHO and Beyond, 617, ESA, (2006)
I. Daubechies. Ten Lectures on Wavelets. 61 of CBMS-NSF Regional Conference Series in Applied Mathematics (SIAM, Philadelphia, 1992)
K.P. Dere, G.E. Brueckner, R.A. Howard, D.J. Michels, J.P. Delaboudiniere, LASCO and EIT observations of helical structure in coronal mass ejections. ApJ. 516(1), 465 (1999)
E. Echer, W.D. Gonzalez, M.V. Alves, On the geomagnetic effects of solar wind interplanetary magnetic structures. Space Weather. 4(6) (2006)
J.T. Gosling, E. Hildner, R.M. MacQueen, R.H. Munro, A.I. Poland, C.L. Ross, Mass ejections from the sun: a view from Skylab. J. Geophys. Res. 79(31), 4581–4587 (1974)
J.C. Goswami, A.K. Chan. Fundamentals of Wavelets: Theory, Algorithms, and Applications, 2nd edn. (Wiley, 2011)
T.A. Howard, D. Nandy, A.C. Koepke, Kinematic properties of solar coronal mass ejections: correction for projection effects in spacecraft coronagraph measurements. J. Geophys. Res. 113(A1), A01104 (2008)
R.M.E. Illing, A.J. Hundhausen, Observation of a coronal transient from 1.2 to 6 solar radii. J. Geophys. Res. 90(A1), 275–282 (1985)
N.G. Kingsbury, The dual-tree complex wavelet transform: A new efficient tool for image restoration and enhancement. in European Signal Processing Conference, EUSIPCO 98. Rhodes, USA., pp. 319–322, (1998a)
N.G. Kingsbury, The dual-tree complex wavelet transform: A new technique for shift invariance and directional filters. in IEEE Digital Signal Processing Workshop DSP. Bryce Canyon, USA., pp. 319–322, (1998b)
N.G. Kingsbury, Complex wavelets for shift invariant analysis and filtering of signals. Appl. Comput. Harmon. A. 10(3), 234–253 (2001)
S. Mallat. A Wavelet Tour of Signal Processing, (Wavelet Analysis & Its Applications), 2nd edn. (Academic Press, 1999)
S.P. Plunkett, A. Vourlidas, S. Šimberová, M. Karlický, P. Kotrč, P. Heinzel, Y.A. Kupryakov, W.P. Guo, S.T. Wu, Simultaneous SOHO and ground-based observations of a large eruptive prominence and coronal mass ejection. Sol. Phys. 194, 371–391 (2000)
I.W. Selesnick, R.G. Baraniuk, N.G Kingsbury, The dual-tree complex wavelet transform. IEEE Signal Process. Mag. 22(6), 123–151 (2005)
G. Stenborg, P.J. Cobelli, A wavelet packets equalization technique to reveal the multiple spatial-scale nature of coronal structures. A&A. 398(3), 1185–1193 (2003)
G. Stenborg, A. Vourlidas, R.A. Howard, A fresh view of the extreme-ultraviolet corona from the application of a new image-processing technique. ApJ. 674, 1201–1206 (2008)
D. Tripathi, G. Stenborg, On the internal structures of coronal mass ejections. in The Dynamic Sun: Challenges for Theory and Observations. 600, ESA, (2005)
Acknowledgments
The authors thank the grants provided by FAPESP 2014/ 21229-9, 2007/ 07723-7; CAPES 126/2012-83; CNPq 307511/2010-3, 312246/2013-7; the authors also thank ESA and NASA for providing the SOHO/ LASCO images used in this work. SOHO is a project of international collaboration between the European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA. The authors are grateful to Eng. Varlei Menconi by the computational assistance (FAPESP 2008/09736-1, CNPq 302451/2013-7), and Prof. Dr. Nick Kingsbury for the fruitful scientific discussions, the codes, and the lectures given in the Workshop in Wavelet Applications (WWLET-2012).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Souza, V.M., Domingues, M.O., Mendes, O. et al. Enhancement of Space Plasma Images by Complex Wavelets. Braz J Phys 45, 510–517 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13538-015-0349-4
Received:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13538-015-0349-4