Helioseismology challenges models of solar convection
Abstract
Convection is the mechanism by which energy is transported through the outermost 30% of the Sun. Solar turbulent convection is notoriously difficult to model across the entire convection zone where the density spans many orders of magnitude. In this issue of PNAS, Hanasoge et al. (2012) employ recent helioseismic observations to derive stringent empirical constraints on the amplitude of large-scale convective velocities in the solar interior. They report an upper limit that is far smaller than predicted by a popular hydrodynamic numerical simulation.
- Publication:
-
Proceedings of the National Academy of Science
- Pub Date:
- July 2012
- DOI:
- 10.1073/pnas.1208875109
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1208.6154
- Bibcode:
- 2012PNAS..10911896G
- Keywords:
-
- Astrophysics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics;
- Physics - Fluid Dynamics
- E-Print:
- Printed in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2 pages, 1 figure). Available at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/doi/10.1073/pnas.1208875109