Causes of an AD 774-775 14C increase

Abstract

Atmospheric 14C production is a potential window into the energy of solar proton and other cosmic ray events. It was previously concluded that results from AD 774-775 are orders of magnitude greater than known solar events. We find that the coronal mass ejection energy based on 14C production is much smaller than claimed, but still substantially larger than the maximum historical Carrington Event of 1859. Such an event would cause great damage to modern technology, and in view of recent confirmation of superflares on solar-type stars, this issue merits attention.

Published online Nature Nov 29, 2012

References in corpus (5)

• Superflares on Ordinary Solar-Type Stars
• Astrophysical Ionizing Radiation and the Earth: A Brief Review and Census of Intermittent Intense Sources
• Terrestrial Consequences of Spectral and Temporal Variability in Ionizing Photon Events
• Modeling atmospheric effects of the September 1859 Solar Flare
• Eruptions from solar ephemeral regions as an extension of the size distribution of coronal mass ejections

Cited by in corpus (36)

• The AD775 cosmic event revisited: the Sun is to blame
• Extreme solar events
• Suppression of Coronal Mass Ejections in active stars by an overlying large-scale magnetic field: A numerical study
• The Stellar CME-flare relation: What do historic observations reveal?
• Cosmic Rays and Terrestrial Life: A Brief Review
• Risks for life on habitable planets from superflares of their host stars
• On the role of GRBs on life extinction in the Universe
• Terrestrial effects of possible astrophysical sources of an AD 774-775 increase in 14C production
• A Monster CME Obscuring A Demon Star Flare
• A rapid cosmic-ray increase in BC 3372-3371 from ancient buried tree rings in China
• Solar activity around AD 775 from aurorae and radiocarbon
• Two Sun-like Superflare Stars Rotating as Slow as the Sun
• Historical Auroras in the 990s: Evidence for Great Magnetic Storms
• Anchoring historical sequences using a new source of astro-chronological tie-points
• Solar irradiance changes and phytoplankton productivity in Earth's ocean following astrophysical ionizing radiation events
• Modelling Cosmic Radiation Events in the Tree-ring Radiocarbon Record
• Supernovae and Single-Year Anomalies in the Atmospheric Radiocarbon Record
• From cosmic explosions to terrestrial fires?
• Low time resolution analysis of polar ice cores cannot detect impulsive nitrate events
• Atmospheric ionization by high-fluence, hard spectrum solar proton events and their probable appearance in the ice core archive
• Records of sunspot and aurora activity during 581-959 CE in Chinese official histories in the periods of Suí, Táng, and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms
• Modeling high-energy cosmic ray induced terrestrial and atmospheric neutron flux: A lookup table
• A comet could not produce the carbon-14 spike in the 8th century
• A review of East Asian reports of aurorae and comets circa AD 775
• A solar super-flare as cause for the 14C variation in AD 774/5 ?
• Variations of 14-C around AD 775 and AD 1795 - due to solar activity
• Solar Energetic Particle Ground-Level Enhancements and the Solar Cycle
• A link between solar events and congenital malformations: Is ionizing radiation enough to explain it?
• The Chinese comet observation in AD 773 January
• Cosmogenic nuclide enhancement via deposition from long-period comets as a test of the Younger Dryas impact hypothesis
• Ozone depletion-induced climate change following a 50 pc supernova
• Searching Signals in Chinese Ancient Records for the ${}^{14}$C Increases in AD 774-775 and in AD 992-993
• A possible role for stochastic radiation events in the systematic disparity between molecular and fossil dates
• Consequences of Energetic Magnetar-Like Outbursts of Nearby Neutron Stars: ${}^{14}$C Events and the Cosmic Electron Spectrum
• Did high-energy astrophysical sources contribute to Martian atmospheric loss?
• (Simulating) Coronal Mass Ejections in Active Stars