Capturing transient plasma flows and jets in the solar corona

Abstract

Intensity bursts in ultraviolet (UV) to X-ray wavelengths and plasma jets are typical signatures of magnetic reconnection and the associated impulsive heating of the solar atmospheric plasma. To gain new insights into the process, high-cadence observations are required to capture the rapid response of plasma to magnetic reconnection as well as the highly dynamic evolution of jets. Here, we report the first 2 s cadence extreme-UV observations recorded by the 174 Å High Resolution Imager of the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager on board the Solar Orbiter mission. These observations, covering a quiet-Sun coronal region, reveal the onset signatures of magnetic reconnection as localized heating events. These localized sources then exhibit repeated plasma eruptions or jet activity. Our observations show that this spatial morphological change from localized sources to jet activity could occur rapidly on timescales of about 20 s. The jets themselves are intermittent and are produced from the source region on timescales of about 20 s. In the initial phases of these events, plasma jets are observed to exhibit speeds, as inferred from propagating intensity disturbances, in the range of 100 km s${}^{-1}$ to 150 km s${}^{-1}$. These jets then propagate to lengths of about 5 Mm. We discuss examples of bidirectional and unidirectional jet activity observed to have been initiated from the initially localized bursts in the corona. The transient nature of coronal bursts and the associated plasma flows or jets along with their dynamics could provide a benchmark for magnetic reconnection models of coronal bursts and jets.

Accepted for publication in A&A Letters (version after language corrections; online animations available from the corresponding author)

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• A Statistical Study of Short-period Decayless Oscillations of Coronal Loops in an Active Region
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• Fleeting Small-scale Surface Magnetic Fields Build the Quiet-Sun Corona
• Moving structures in ultraviolet bright points: observations from Solar Orbiter/EUI
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• A spectroscopic investigation of thermal instability for cylindrical equilibria with background flow
• Three-dimensional Magnetic and Thermodynamic Structures of Solar Microflares
• Thermodynamic properties of small flares in the quiet Sun observed by H$\alpha$ and EUV: plasma motion of the chromosphere and time evolution of temperature/emission measure
• A multi-viewpoint comparison of the velocity field of coronal propagating disturbances
• Multi-scale Energy Release Events in the Quiet Sun: A Possible Source for Coronal Heating
• SolO/EUI Observations of Ubiquitous Fine-scale Bright Dots in an Emerging Flux Region: Comparison with a Bifrost MHD Simulation