Modeling a Maunder Minimum

Abstract

We introduce on/off intermittency into a mean field dynamo model by imposing stochastic fluctuations in either the alpha effect or through the inclusion of a fluctuating electromotive force. Sufficiently strong small scale fluctuations with time scales of the order of 0.3-3 years can produce long term variations in the system on time scales of the order of hundreds of years. However, global suppression of magnetic activity in both hemispheres at once was not observed. The variation of the magnetic field does not resemble that of the sunspot number, but is more reminiscent of the 10 Be record. The interpretation of our results focuses attention on the connection between the level of magnetic activity and the sunspot number, an issue that must be elucidated if long term solar effects are to be well understood.

8 pages, 6 figures, Astron. Nachr. (submitted)

References in corpus (9)

• The case for a distributed solar dynamo shaped by near-surface shear
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• The butterfly diagram in the 18th century
• Solar Grand Minima and random fluctuations in dynamo parameters
• Models for the long-term variations of solar activity
• Long-term modulation of solar cycles
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• Stellar mid-life crisis: subcritical magnetic dynamos of solar-like stars and the breakdown of gyrochronology
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• On-off intermittency and amplitude-phase synchronization in Keplerian shear flows
• Galactic dynamo action in presence of stochastic alpha and shear
• Variational estimation of the large scale time dependent meridional circulation in the Sun: proofs of concept with a solar mean field dynamo model
• Cycles and cycle modulations