The clock inside the Sun.
Abstract
It is suggested that the phase of the solar cycle seems to be locked to the phase of some precisely tuned internal oscillator and that there is apparently a close correlation between the phase error of the sunspot cycle relative to this oscillator and the peak sunspot number. A tentative model involving buoyant magnetic flux tubes is considered which gives a frequency of 0.4460 + or - 0.00007 cycles per year for the internal oscillator. Filtered data based on the Epstein-Yapp statistical indicator are shown to yield a power spectrum with one prominent peak having a frequency of 0.04472 + or - 0.00012 cycles per year, which differs by only 0.27% from the frequency of the solar cycle. A model based on a solar core distorted by a strong toroidal magnetic field is tentatively proposed.
- Publication:
-
New Scientist
- Pub Date:
- July 1979
- Bibcode:
- 1979NewSc..83...12D
- Keywords:
-
- Solar Cycles;
- Solar Magnetic Field;
- Stellar Models;
- Sunspot Cycle;
- Buoyancy;
- Correlation;
- Magnetic Effects;
- Magnetic Field Configurations;
- Power Spectra;
- Solar Physics;
- Solar Physics;
- Solar Activity Cycles