Small-scale transient phenomena in solar atmosphere, including microflares, nanoflares, jets and type-II spicules, are believed to be influential for channelling energy into the corona. While microflares and nanoflares display energetics several orders-of-magnitude lower than large-scale flare events, their higher occurrence rates may mean their overall contribution to atmospheric heating cannot be neglected. Furthermore, waves are also of significant interest. Oscillatory motions of more acoustic origin often evolve into shocks in the lower atmosphere, providing localised energy dissipation. Contrarily, less easily dissipated waves (such as trapped magneto-acoustic and Alfven modes) can often propagate deep into the corona, thus providing wave energy to these regions of the solar atmosphere. Recently, Hinode and IRIS have been influential when documenting these dynamic phenomena. However, we still require better atmospheric coverage (both in time, space and formation height) to accurately constrain the distinct contributions each of these mechanisms play in the overall coronal energy budget.
We intend to examine the available energy budgets and timescales of reconnection- and wave-related energy propagation. Through a combination of high temporal, spatial and spectral resolution imaging and spectroscopy, from a range of satellite and ground-based telescopes, we propose to examine these events through continual coverage spanning the IR to X-ray portions of the EM spectrum. We will focus our attention on solar active regions where the radiative losses are largest (i.e., requiring more energy input) and atmospheric magnetism is most complex. Complementary data sequences from the Dunn Solar Telescope (see detailed Appendix information below), alongside joint Hinode and IRIS observations, will allow quantitative measurements of the dynamic phenomena, including densities, temperatures, line-of-sight (Doppler) velocities, non-thermal line widths and spectral line asymmetries, to be studied and documented over a vast range of atmospheric heights spanning the photosphere to outer corona. The simultaneous nature of the observations will allow temporal and spatial correlations (through techniques such as phase analysis) to be undertaken, particularly between the chromosphere and lower corona where strong interactions are believed to take place. |
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