On the Inversion of the Scattering Polarization and the Hanle Effect Signals in the Hydrogen Ly-alpha Line
Informazioni aggiuntive
Autori
Ishikawa R.,
Asensio Ramos A.,
Belluzzi L.,
Manso Sainz R.,
Stepan J.,
Trujillo Bueno J.,
Goto M.,
Tsuneta S.
Tipo
Articolo pubblicato in rivista scientifica
Anno
2014
Lingua
Inglese
Abstract
Magnetic field measurements in the upper chromosphere and above, where the gas-to-magnetic pressure ratio β is lower than unity, are essential for understanding the thermal structure and dynamical activity of the solar atmosphere. Recent developments in the theory and numerical modeling of polarization in spectral lines have suggested that information on the magnetic field of the chromosphere-corona transition region could be obtained by measuring the linear polarization of the solar disk radiation at the core of the hydrogen Lyα line at 121.6 nm, which is produced by scattering processes and the Hanle effect. The Chromospheric Lyman-Alpha SpectroPolarimeter (CLASP) sounding rocket experiment aims to measure the intensity (Stokes I) and the linear polarization profiles (Q/I and U/I) of the hydrogen Lyα line. In this paper, we clarify the information that the Hanle effect can provide by applying a Stokes inversion technique based on a database search. The database contains all theoretical Q/I and U/I profiles calculated in a one-dimensional semi-empirical model of the solar atmosphere for all possible values of the strength, inclination, and azimuth of the magnetic field vector, though this atmospheric region is highly inhomogeneous and dynamic. We focus on understanding the sensitivity of the inversion results to the noise and spectral resolution of the synthetic observations as well as the ambiguities and limitation inherent to the Hanle effect when only the hydrogen Lyα is used. We conclude that spectropolarimetric observations with CLASP can indeed be a suitable diagnostic tool for probing the magnetism of the transition region, especially when complemented with information on the magnetic field azimuth that can be obtained from other instruments.
Rivista
Astrophysical Journal
Volume
787
Pagina inizio
159
Parole chiave
irsol-refereed-scientific-papers
