There’s been a little discussion about the plage area that came around the solar rim in the last two days, and now it appears that it has formed a spot. (h/t to Leif Svalgaard)
Click for full sized image
Note that other similar sized black “specks” on the image are stuck pixels in the SOHO imager.
The question now is: how long will the sunspeck last? Longevity has not been a virtue for similarly sized sunspecks this year.
UPDATE: As of 1600 UTC 10-05-2008 the speck is gone on the latest SOHO MDI – Anthony
Jan Janssens has an interesting discussion on it (h/t to John-x)
4 October 08 – There is a new sunspotgroup visible on the southern solar hemisphere (as already reported yesterday by Pete Lawrence on the Spaceweather-website).
Belgian solar observers saw earlier this morning at least one sunspot clearly in this region.
Interestingly, Locarno (07:15 UT ; Q=2) and SIDC/Ukkel (07:45 UT ; Q=2?) did not report anything just a few hours earlier… Kanzelhöhe (09:03UT) did notice a bipolar group.
My own observations (C8, 68x) do not show “clearly” a B-group: a clear Axx for sure, but if there’s still something there, it rather looks like a small photospheric region imbedded in somewhat brighter faculae fields… A greyish pore at most (at least around 8:30UT, with Q=3 and some cirrus). The region is also very nice in H-alpha: 3 closely packed and relatively bright small areas, with some dark fibrils in the neighbourhood.
GONG-images also show the group. NSO-magnetograms clearly reflect an overnight enhancement of the magnetic fields in this region. The polarity is that of a SC23-group… at a latitude of at least -20°… This can possibly still be a high latitude SC23-group. Late June 1997, NOAA 8056 -with SC22-polarity- appeared with a latitude of +17°. See SOHO for magnetogram, and Kanzelhöhe for a drawing. The nearby group is NOAA 8055, a SC23-group (= new cycle) at +15°! And this happened more than a year after cycle minimum and the start of SC23. I have no magnetograms of earlier SC-transits to evaluate how exceptional or common all this is. At least this is a new element for discussion!
http://users.telenet.be/j.janssens/Engwelcome.html
edcon (15:12:15) :
I want to thank you for your tremendous insight and work that is very helpful to an old old engineer interested in learning something new.
Thanks for your interest and questions.
Leif Svalgaard (11:14:59) : edcon (10:26:27) :Leif Svalgaard (09:44:08) :
REPLY: Leif I went to your research page http://www.leif.org/research/
to see if you had a PDF of this. I looked at several papers, and immediately rejected them, didn’t bother to read them at all. Why?
The PDF’s (that I looked at such as http://www.leif.org/research/IAGA2008LS.pdf ) have the pages rotated, making reading them online in a PDF reader a maddening excercise. Why in the world would you publish this way? You are hamstringing yourself. Readability is king. – Anthony
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Anthony,
I have no problems accessing and viewing these. With Lief’s permission, I will gladly make them ‘”ct right” in the viewer of your choice.
garron (19:34:01) :
Who’s attempt?
A Henrik Svensmark has attempted to show that GCRs and [the very noisy] low cloud record are correlated and that there is a physical connection.
“act right”
Leif Svalgaard (11:37:27) : REPLY: Yep, the rotate feature in Adobe reader is well hidden, I didn’t know it existed. Learned something new today, thanks. – Anthony
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That was it? Silly guy… 🙂
Leif Svalgaard (11:14:59) :
“Moreover, the geomagnetic range series, which in itself is a long-term proxy of solar FUV emission, can be used to resolve discrepancies between the Wolf and Group SSN series during the 19th century.”
I am interested in this area and also trying to test the accuracy of the sunspot counts pre 1912. Does anyone have any proxy data that can be used to cross check the Wolf SSN’s as well as cycle lengths. I am looking for data that is measured on a yearly basis.
nobwainer (20:17:08) :
“Moreover, the geomagnetic range series, which in itself is a long-term proxy of solar FUV emission, can be used to resolve discrepancies between the Wolf and Group SSN series during the 19th century.”
I am interested in this area and also trying to test the accuracy of the sunspot counts pre 1912. Does anyone have any proxy data that can be used to cross check the Wolf SSN’s as well as cycle lengths. I am looking for data that is measured on a yearly basis.
I’m working on such a series [have a preliminary one, of course], but the ‘adjustment’ will not change the lengths of the cycles.
Bill P (12:43:10) :”Ultimately these cap-and-trade politicians pose a serious threat to individual wealth.”
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Only under a dictatorship. The elected will always moderate to the “electable” position(s).
Leif Svalgaard (20:31:28) :
nobwainer (20:17:08) :
If you want to play [at your own risk] with my series [the corrected sunspot number and the derived TSI], you can get them here [in different formats]:
http://www.leif.org/research/Corrected%20SSN%20and%20TSI.xls
http://www.leif.org/research/Corrected%20SSN%20and%20TSI.txt
http://www.leif.org/research/Corrected%20SSN%20and%20TSI.prn
Leif Svalgaard (20:09:41) : “A Henrik Svensmark has attempted to show that GCRs and [the very noisy] low cloud record are correlated and that there is a physical connection.”
I’ll get back to this in a day or so. I’m under the impression that he is attempting to validate a theory.
garron (20:43:32) :
I’ll get back to this in a day or so. I’m under the impression that he is attempting to validate a theory.
So far, the ‘validation’ is a correlation.
Thanks Leif….working though them now
edcon:
LS has been scholar, a gentleman & a jolly good fellow… 😉
I’m here in chilly & foggy Rhode Island helping the in-laws getting ready for their big reunion. One thing I’m looking fwd to is teasing the family astrophysicist with questions about heliophysical models, SC#24, TSI, GCR flux & climate. I’ll be out of my depth, horribly, but it’ll make for good conversation over beer & steaks. And just in case anyone brings up AGW or an incipient little ice age, I’ll have my talking points ready…. http://i32.tinypic.com/28h3dqh.jpg http://i27.tinypic.com/25fuk8w.jpg
As for the sun, here’s what I’ve learnt thus far of the likely effect the sun has generally on climate (starting with what’s NOT likely):
It’s likely not TSI (nor sunspots nor facular UV, it’s not much different from the 1950’s), nor the solar wind (it’s where it was in the early 20th C), not marine thermomagnetism nor terawatt-level solar storms (quite a bit shy of the hourly petawatt scale) and certainly not barycentric perturbations.
That leaves us with decreased heliomagnetic output (relative to the big minimum of the mid-1950’s leading into SC19), increased galactic cosmic ray flux, an unexpected contemporary increase in cloud cover & commensurate albedo.
So naturally we then understand that with the current spotless day count climbing with a strong trend comparable with 19th century solar cycles http://users.telenet.be/j.janssens/Spotless/Spotless.html#Evolution, it suggests we might finally see the anecdotal yet spurious historical role of sunspots reveal the actual role of heliomagnetism and galactic cosmic rays with historical periods of relative coolth here on Earth.
Leif Svalgaard (20:59:45) :”So far, the ‘validation’ is a correlation.”
If you have evidence, or a verifiable direct Svensmark quote, inditing him as a disingenuous scientist — please, lay it on me.
Otherwise, please let me finish reading the “cloud” rebuttals to the rebuttals of the rebuttals and so forth.
So far, I have found no replication or review of his physical lab work.
garron (03:11:27) :
If you have evidence, or a verifiable direct Svensmark quote, inditing him as a disingenuous scientist — please, lay it on me.
Svensmark is [hopefully] sincere. You can easily find references to his work without my help, see e.g. his book “the chilling stars” or some such.
So far, I have found no replication or review of his physical lab work.
http://www.nerc.ac.uk/press/releases/2006/cosmicclouds.asp
Dr. Svalgaard, in you opinion, where might Dr. Shaviv have taken a wrong turn: http://www.sciencebits.com/CosmicRaysClimate
Craig Moore (14:24:43) :
where might Dr. Shaviv have taken a wrong turn
The issue of cosmic rays and temperature millions of years ago is so uncertain that I would not attach much significance to it. The real test should be with our modern data. To me, the most important fact is that the Sun’s magnetic state and the the solar wind [and hence the cosmic ray intensity] right now is what it was a century ago, while the climate is not. If you counter that the CRs only accounts for a small part of the climate change, then you can recover from that difference, but I think that CR advocates would like their mechanism to be a primary driver of climate so would not relegate CRs to be just a minor contributor.
Leif Svalgaard (05:30:45) :
“The real test should be with our modern data. To me, the most important fact is that the Sun’s magnetic state and the the solar wind [and hence the cosmic ray intensity] right now is what it was a century ago, while the climate is not.”
You seem to push this argument quite a bit. I would think you would need to go back further than a 100 years to see the sun in a similar position…prob more likely at the start of the Dalton. The deviation in true temp today is prob not far away from a century ago and we are still getting off a hi point, not like a century ago.
This reminds me of my freshman class in chemistry. Standing alone, two chemicals do nothing. They don’t burn your skin, smoke, or make loud noises. Combine them and the air is filled with a thousand stink bombs. cycles that alone, do nothing, can coincide and cover my home with cold snow for longer than I can remember. Could that be why correlation is found to be closer and closer to 1.0 when several different cycles (which are relatively anemic cycles on their own) coincide and then compared to temperature differences?
nobwainer (06:22:28) :
You seem to push this argument quite a bit. I would think you would need to go back further than a 100 years to see the sun in a similar position…prob more likely at the start of the Dalton.
We actually have the Inferred Solar Wind data back to the 1830s with the same result, see page 24 of http://www.leif.org/research/IAGA2008LS.pdf