Not much time for a full report, as it is very late for me, but I’ll pass this along from comments. Looks to be cycle 23 due to low latitude. – Anthony
Looks like a sunspot has appeared recently, as of Oct 9, 1600. Magnetogram also shows a spot. Is this the last spot that had blinked in and out?
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_igr/1024/latest.html
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/javagif/gifs_small/20081009_1600_mdi_mag.gif
H/t to Glenn
Not the sun, but: Out of the mouths of babes…
http://kidsagainstagw.com/
[…] http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/10/09/speck-spotted-looks-to-be-cycle-23 […]
Funny with the lack of spots, specks that wouldnt even be noticed during a solar max are being highly publicized. Could this be the one that starts it all.. lol. Seems like some folks at Nasa are getting pretty desperate for a large solar max to start. But if temp lagging activity level is going to show up as predicted their lovely models will still be off and they still wont be able to explain why our world temp has not raised in the drastic way they predicted. One thing I am happy about is that some reputable scientists are learning from the sun during this time of low spot activity. There have been some pretty cool discoveries in the past couple of years, you just have to break through the layer of crap that has come to surround Nasa.
Speaking of weather coolers… this weeks volcano activity report shows new activity on 6 volcanoes. http://www.volcano.si.edu/reports/usgs/ I would sure love to see a paper compairing lower magnetic fields with increases in volcanic activity.. wonder if there would be anything similar. I have been seeing quite a few papers recently including major volcanic activity during a minimum to explain excessively cooler temps or warmth slowers as it were. There has also been a ton of activity in the ring of fire, I have no “normal” to compare that to but if the pick up of large seismic activity is any indicator then our earth is responding to a stimulas we do not yet even know exists.
Interesting : a new sunspeck without ANY other activity.
Planetary K-Index : 0
Ap – Index : 0
X-ray flux : 0
And the solar wind already decreased at very low level.
(www.solarcycle24.com)
TSI reached quite a low level now.
Earth is cooling ? It is not really sure for now : we need 3 or 4 more years to check if the 6 years old recent trend get confirmed. Maybe a mega-niña during the next years (months ?), maybe not. We will see.
BUT : I think ground is cooling now. 0,1 to 0,3 W/m2 less every day doesn’t make a difference for one day. IT DOES make a difference if the trend lasts more than a couple of monthes. It already happened in 2004 (see UAH and RSS : the 2004 dive is ONLY connected to TSI dive and the ground temps evolution).
All the best to this excellent blog.
My august SWAG for 850 kvisitors is already overtaken.
This blog deserves the million.
I might be wrong but, with this weak sun, I think tracking ground temps is really interesting… as we all live on the ground ( at least 99,9 % of us :-).
Southern hemisphere – black leading white – that ought to make it SC23.
SWPC still not listing this event; when {or if} they do, it’ll be the second SC23 event for the month.
SC23 – it just keeps going and going and going…
off-topic: I frequently follow the climate news here and in a few other places, but I in the past couple of weeks I’ve been completely absorbed into the finance world to follow the present crisis. But during that, I found this amazing article, which describes the greenies trying to benefict from the crisis: http://www.thebigmoney.com/articles/mothers-milk/2008/10/08/save-economy-save-planet, with rethorics that go to the point of asking “How does a climate bill become a stimulus package [for the present crisis]?”. How can these people be so disconnected to the real world? And what frightens me is their influence on powerful people that could make many of their proposals be considered. And that won’t help the present situation.
oops, the link I shared above is not linked 😉 it should lead you here. BTW, I suggest the addition of a preview button for the comments in your blog.
pkatt (01:19:01) :
“this weeks volcano activity report shows new activity on 6 volcanoes. http://www.volcano.si.edu/reports/usgs/”
Thanks for the link, now added to my favourites. After the Indian Ocean earthquake in 2004 geologists predicted the adjoining plates would take a number of years to settle and this may well be part of the process.
off-topic from new scientist an area in spain with a lot of green houses experiences a local cooling due to more light being reflected from the roofs. reverse UHI, hope the temperature records will be adjusted up to account for this.
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/mg20026775.000-the-greenhouse-effect-that-may-be-cooling-the-climate.html?DCMP=ILC-hmts&nsref=news1_head_mg20026775.000
It will be very interesting to see if we go into the normal pattern when SC24 finally kicks in, or will we witness what Makarov & Tlatov (2000) talk about here:
According to Ribes et al. (1993) in the Maunder Minimum the active regions were observed only near the equator. This fact of long occurrence of the sunspots near the equator is unique. In the normal solar cycles active regions practically do not emerge in a zone of ±5° around the equator. The occurrence of active regions during a long time near the equator of the Sun may be taken to testify as a case of a “long solar cycle”. This version of a “long solar cycle” is confirmed by the study of the 14 C content variations in the bi-annual rings of the pine-trees from South Urals over AD 1600–1730, Kocharov et al. (1995) (Fig. 2). In fact, 14 C content shows the cycle length to be about 20 yrs in 1640–1715 in accordance with poleward migration
rate.
According to Waldmeier (1957), solar activity on a branch of growth of a century
cycle dominates in the northern hemisphere, and on a branch of decay in the southern hemisphere. Actually, in 1672–1704 practically no sunspots were observed in the northern hemisphere (Ribes & Nesme-Ribes 1993). At such low activity of the Sun in the northern hemisphere polar magnetic field reversal was possible only in the southern hemisphere. In this epoch the structure of the magnetic field of the Sun was of a “monopole” type, i.e: both poles of the Sun had the same polarity. Such state of solar magnetic field was repeatedly observed in 1955–1982 yrs (Makarov 1984).
In 1705 the Wolf number increased and became sufficient for polar magnetic field reversal and hence the structure of a magnetic field was restored.
“I would sure love to see a paper compairing lower magnetic fields with increases in volcanic activity”… even more interesting would be to study the correlation between sunspot number and the Dow Jones index 😉
Twinkle, twinkle little Sun
Your spotlessness puzzles everyone
Though over 95 million miles away
Our eyes are on you every day.
You leave us with little evidence
That your next cycle has commenced
Your calm demeanor causes a fuss
When we see your blank face staring back at us.
What must you think, our solar sovereign
Of all these questions asked so often
The where’s and hows and why’s and whens
Of inquisitive creatures, us little men.
So twinkle, twinkle not-so-little star,
And we will wonder at what you are
Up above our world so high
Like a diamond in our sky.
With global temps expectd to cool over the next decade (Keelyside et al 2008), via yet another “model” to 2015-2018, this volcanic activity more than likely (sorry should that be “likely to very likely) looks set to give the Green lobby more ammunition to claim Mother Nature has come to the rescue of mankind.
Of course, no sunspots will be ignored, despite solar magnetic field, TSI, & temp all apparently in decline & at a 50 year low! BTW, this solar news has actually reached the BBC’s news website, a grudingly small article compared with the plethora of doom & gloom climate articels, but rest assured those in the “know” made damned sure it never surfaced on the tv or radio at all!
Solar Cycle 24 has been shifted back yet again, another “model” has got it wrong, again! Why don’t we just wait, watch, observe & record, then draw a conclusion. Perhaps we are obsessed with trying to predict what clearly is the unpredictable! This is what happens when we think we’re really very clever & we can programme a computer to tell us everything. It’s rather like’t read Hitchikers Guide to the Universe – computer Deep Thought reduced everything to a simple sum to solve the meaning of life, the universe, & well, everything, that resolved itself to 5 x 9 = 42! Nothing changes does it?
This whole thing about “specks” is simply absurd. There’s no way that scientists before the space age could have spotted such a speck, or even bothered to record it.
The Sun is clearly in a deep minimum, and David Hathaway keeps changing his prediction without any explanation as to why previous predictions failed. He’s bound to be right one day, as if that meant anything.
Does anyone know where to find the Martian climate figures? I checked the site of the Mars Climate orbiter, but I couldn’t find any actual figures.
It might be interesting to see if the current lull in solar activity is having any effect on the Mars Climate.
Helvio:
“How can these people be so disconnected to the real world?”
Politicians have been disconnected from what most of us would consider the real world for quite some time.
That’s leading to a revolution…just a question of when :*)
Jim
Off topic but I thought people may like to see a BBC report that was on the news last night
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/video/default.stm
AGW is a “fact” at the BBC (AND THE REST OF THE ESTABLISHMENT). Little things like global cooling chilling the nation will make them look foolish. The part about the algae is interesting though. I think I’ve seen a post on this site about algae before.
Thanks for the volcano link…that could turn out to be very interesting.
Is that another possible speck in the southern hemisphere, just rotating into view? That edge of the magnetogram always seems slightly blurred, but on the MDI continuum shot, it’s showing what appears to be a light colored area just about the lowest stuck pixel.
A reminder – It’s just a frigging sunspeck!!! Thank you, I feel better. 🙂
The magnetogram is remarkably flat, there I’ve remarked on it.
There seems to be some activity in the lower left area, the magnetogram suggests opposite polarity, but it might be just a flare or whatnot. It shows up well in the first three EIT images at http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime-images.html
I should learn to read these images better.
Alan the Brit (05:22:34) Hathaway has all the signs of a man who has forgotten his towel.
======================================
I have been waiting for a solar related thread.
Questions:
How do you read the LASCO plots?
How are they generated (Instrumentation, method, repeatability)?
Are the filtered pictures of the sun simply CCD raster shots?
Are there infrared scans available or UV?
How is the magnetogram produced?
Surely there are some people here that are bursting with information on this subject. I have looked for resources on the SOHO site but was dissapointed.
I believe that Deep Thought’s expression should be 6 x 7 = 42.
At least that is what the text of the book references as one of possible question for which the Answer to the question of Life, the Unveverse, and Everything might be.
Ric,
The magnetogram is remarkably flat, there I’ve remarked on it.
It’s remarkable that you’ve remarked on it. I find it interesting the state of the sun, and the increased number of viewing devices we have trained on a blank sun. Would these specks go unnoticed if cycle 24 had started as they (NASA) had expected?
SWPC is now listing this event, which officially makes it the second SC23 event for the month.
If we are witnessing the slow unfolding of a new minimum, it may be months before the magnitude of this fact becomes clearer. In the meantime, all we can do is to continue to experience the slow drip, drip, drip of the quick appearance/disappearance of sunspecks.
As far as the study of the sun goes, we do live in interesting times.
The low latitude southern hemisphere SC23 event is now showing two very small sunspots. This event has now survived 18 hours. The event is moving with the solar rotation; and yes, I checked for burned out pixels, the spots are that small. Looks like SC23 is making a showing
Good comments all.
I know many may have read this article before me but Jan Janssens’ discussion here has a few gems.
http://users.telenet.be/j.janssens/MSCwebEng.pdf
on his Solaemon site under “Case for missing cycle”.
Even though Usoskin’s hypothesis is unsupported the breaking of the Gnevyshev-Ohl rule points (if provisionally) to a Dalton, Maunder, et al., event.
Also the ‘Waldmeier effect’, which he calls one of the more reliable “rules”, points to a low, late maximum for 24.
http://www.frbatlanta.org/filelegacydocs/wp0305b.pdf
Here is a study done by the Federal Reserve Bakn on Geomagnetic storms and the stock market among other things. It is a serious work.
REPLY: yes I’m aware of it, in fact I’m writing a post on it, but waiting for some ancillary research to be located. – Anthony
The difficulty in identification of spots suggests someone needs to better define standards for spots. The past records and skills should also be classified so they can be compared to present technologies, but this seems like something which many examiners of past records should have already done so maybe I’m just not aware of where that record is stored.
Alan the Brit: The models are being used to generate predictions as tests of the models. With the present level of skill, their failure is hardly surprising, but successful prediction would be interesting.
Thanks, Roger. The kid is already thrilled at the number of hit she’s getting on her new site from someone else’s link. She’s using a pseudonym to avoid irritation at school; we and she have difficulty knowing how many others agree with her.
http://kidsagainstagw.com/
Gregori, Annals of Geophysics, 1/1/96:
Provides evidence supporting Joule heating as periodic driving mechanism of volcanism, and postulates link between magnetic field reversal events and planetary volcanism cycles:
http://www.earth-prints.org/bitstream/2122/1642/1/05%20gregori.pdf
Scott Covert (07:12:27) :
“Surely there are some people here that are bursting with information on this subject. I have looked for resources on the SOHO site but was dissapointed.”
Did you see the SOHO link to http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/image-description.html ? That answers several questions, but I’m sure leaves a few.
Quick notes for now – the EIT images are different UV wavelengths (EIT = Extreme ultraviolet Imaging Telescope).
I think the magnetogram images are produced by looking at separation in the wavelengths of excited ions (e.g. things like the sodium spectral “lines”). In a strong magnetic field a line separates into two components, in direct proportion or so to the field strngth. I don’t know how the field direction is determined, but I’d expect that it shows up in the polarization of the light. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeeman_effect for more.
This is absolutely the finest entertainment I’ve seen in the religious world in a LONG time…there is almost NO difference between the repeated expectations of the Advent of the Messiah (and wow, the number of people who have stood on mountain tops, stocked up caves, committed suicide in these last 2 millenia)…and the expectations of “ADVENT” of Cycle 24. I find it disappointing, though, that someone couldn’t have chosen some multiple of 7 for this coming cycle, 7 being such an important number in prophecy.
Might I quote scripture: “And then if any man shall say to you: Lo, here is 24. Lo, 24 is here: do not believe. ”
ROTFLMAO (for which I do not repent)
I will attach rockets to a kayak and travel to the sun to raise awareness about the quiet sun. I might not get very far, but it will prove my point anyway:
CO2 on earth is has destroyed the delicate balance on the sun, by sending more IR back to the sun. We are near a tipping point. And there’s more quietness in the pipeline. And polar bears might summer blindness from the different sunlight being reflected from the shrinking icecaps(if they don’t drown first)…
Let’s get one thing straight.
Deep Thought’s answer was “42”
Deep Thought’s question was “what is 6 x 9?”
This answer works fine in base 13 math.
kevin: on Mars….
Mars is experiencing global warming,” Michael Malin of Malin Space Science Systems said last month at the Geological Society of America meeting in Denver. “And we don’t know why.”
Click here for story
Mars has warmed about 0.65 degrees in the last two decades. Probably Solar driven, with a dust feed back loop.
Click here for story
sorry, I should have checked the links. The first one is dead, the second to NBC is still good.
2 short Cycle 23 spots outweigh the 1 short Cycle 24 spot so far this month so, as of this minute, we are still in a continuing Cycle 23.
I noted before that August may have been the minimum but the continuation of cycle 23 spots outweighing cycle 24 spots means we still haven’t reached it.
Wyatt A (10:26:40) :
Let’s get one thing straight.
Deep Thought’s answer was “42″
Maybe it got it backwards, it should have been “24” 🙂
Mike Pickett (09:46:46) :
Might I quote scripture: “And then if any man shall say to you: Lo, here is 24. Lo, 24 is here: do not believe… ”
“…for behold, Solar Cycle 24 IS spread upon the sun, and men do not see it (because verily, the contrast is too low).”
Thomas Gospel (Dead Sea Scrolls)
Les Johnson:
Interesting article. Thanks for the link. It is, however, from Apr 2007 and what I’m really interested in is the data for the last decade up to this year.
What I’d like to check out is whether there is any response in the Mars climate that might correllate with the change in the Sun’s behavior. One suggested mechanism for Earth’s possible response is cloud condensation nucleii related to increased cosmic rays. If Mars is currently getting cooler, then that might bring this mechanism into question, but if Mar’s climate is getting warmer, or staying the same over the last few years, then that theory is still in play.
Either way, it might be instructive to compare the climate records of the two planets, together with the Solar cycle, since it might give us some clues as to where to look for climate change mechanisms.
I’m assuming that something like the UAH or RSS monthly anomaly figures might be available from the Mars Climate orbiter, and a look at those might be instructive.
Anthony,
Mechanix Illustrated ran an 8 part series of articles in 1944 (February to October) entitled “Cycles Predict the Future” by Donald G. Cooley. The article links historical events with sun spot cycles, citing 170 year and 510 year cycles as being of major importance and linking them to depressions, wars, famine, and practically everything else. Reference is made to the work of Dr. Raymond H. Wheeler of the University of Kansas.
The articles read about as you might expect, a mixture of talk about sunspot cycles and anecdotal evidence as “science”, but the ones I have are kind of amusing. An example quote: “When the cycle shifts from cold to warm, human energy is high; nations are built. When it shifts from warm to cold, nations crumble. International wars throughout history have occurred during warm periods, civil wars during cold. Now, in 1944, we are near the beginning of a cold period since it has been generally warm for about 45 years. Totalitarianism and dictators are typical of late-half warm periods…But when, as at present, the world moves into a cold period, democracy revives and dictators topple.”
Unfortunately, I only have a couple of the issues, but would be happy to scan and email portions of the articles to you if they might be of any use in the article you are preparing on sun spots and business cycles. Let me know where to send them, if you would like them.
Stu MIller
Thanks a bunch Ric.
That was quite helpfull. It inspired me to do a google search and I have found more reading than I can handle at the moment.
I found a really good link to more images like SOHO with earth based images and plenty of good links to observatories.
http://umbra.nascom.nasa.gov/images/latest.html
Thanks again, I think I understand the LASCO images but it will probably take a while to be able to read them effectively. A solar mimima is probably not the best time to try to interpret the data, I will need to take some time to read old data.
The fact that past historic records of sunspots were limited since they were only observed from earth during blue sky days only should be taken as historical data with its limited precision. But to ignore those pas limitation and claim that the sun is more active toady than during the last deep minimum is to show one’s scientific incompetence.
Today’s “high tech” records are more sensitive and will show lots of things that were not possibly seen in past observations. Today’s records will also be compared to future observations that might show a completely different sun with new parameters and physical properties.
All this to say that we are in a deep visible minimum compared to all the past data. Little changes in a magnetogram does not remove this fact… visible minimum.
Concerning the volcanic activity… could solar activity change the gravitational constant of the sun? Can that be measured?
Wyatt A (10:26:40) :
Let’s get one thing straight.
Deep Thought’s answer was “42″
Deep Thought’s question was “what is 6 x 9?”
This answer works fine in base 13 math.
Deep Thought’s answer was 42. Deep Thought couldn’t explain the question – but he knew who could. A new computer needed to be build, the most complex computer ever concieved. It was a planet – Earth. To ensure the expirement worked correctly, the hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings existed on Earth as mice.
Anyway, the great expirement was corrupted when the Golgafrinchans arrived on Earth. Hence Arthur’s faulty race memory of 6 x 9. Finally, just before the computer was going to give the Great Answer to Life, The Universe and Everything, the Vogons, under the guise of constructing a hyperspace bypass and at the behest of Intergalactic Philosiphers Union (who had the most to lose if the answer was ever known – they would be out of a job).
John-X (11:46:57) :
Mike Pickett (09:46:46) :
Might I quote scripture: “And then if any man shall say to you: Lo, here is 24. Lo, 24 is here: do not believe… ”
“…for behold, Solar Cycle 24 IS spread upon the sun, and men do not see it (because verily, the contrast is too low).”
Thomas Gospel (Dead Sea Scrolls)
…and I command you to look upward into the sky and the truth shall be revealed unto you, but if you should look downwards unto the Earth and upon the devil GISS you shall surely be led astray…..
Pay no attention to the blinding nuclear inferno behind the curtain.
Nothing to see here.
Move along.
Are there infrared scans available or UV?
solarcycle24.com has pretty pictures in all kinds of formats.
Ray (13:46:12) :
There’s only one one gravitational constant recognized, and it applies to all mass. If you could move the mass at relativistic speeds, then its mass would increase, but the Sun did that it would leave the solar system in hours, so scratch that possibility off the list.
Even if the Sun could change its gravitational field by a measurable amount to affect tides on the Earth, the impact on the Earth’s orbit would leave us in a much smaller orbit where we would all fry soon after we realized that things were seriously wrong.
Neilo,
Douglas Adams was ahead of his time: When their ten-million-year experiment failed, the mice didn’t “do the science” (recreate the Earth and run it for ten million years), but instead decided to make up something plausible, do the 5-D lecture circuit, take the money, and run.
Sound familiar?
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime-images.html has all the sun images in the different spectrums and a pretty cool search engine. If you click on the more links I think it shows you a full 24hrs of pictures.
I wonder what is happening to the web stats for the various Solar Science sites? I bet solar scientists are preparing new budgets for new experiments based on them. And I’d much sooner give money to solar scientists than
scam artists and fraudstersclimatologists.spot on anthony even solar 24 is admitting it and they want 24 to come rushing
http://www.solarcycle24.com/
I don’t think any of the presently active volcanoes are energetic enough to drive meaningful amounts of gas and debris into the stratosphere to cause measurable cooling. Kasatochi’s Aug. eruption has made lots of beautiful sunsets but I haven’t heard of any cooling. Since no-one in the MSM or the AGW crowd paid the slightest attention to the warming of the other planets except Mercury (???) during the Solar Grand Maximum, they will ignore any cooling of other planets as well. The Big Lie must be defended at all costs.
At the moment there is a sunspot visible, possible SC24. And it is not a tiny tim. For those without telescope check the latest SOHO images.
Mount Wilson is reporting no sunspots for Friday October 10, 2008. Note comments about the size of sunspots in this drawing.
ftp://howard.astro.ucla.edu/pub/obs/drawings/dr081010.jpg
The Belgium SIDC has assigned a number 1004 and a value of 12 but I can no longer see any spots on the SOHO images. Very strange reporting all around.
Meanwhile a moderately sized sunspot cluster has developed on the Sun’s northern-hemisphere high-latitude eastern-limb. It appears to have a SC24 signature and a value in excess of 15. This one appears to be growing in size and is a keeper.
SC24 certainly is ramping up now, 2nd “powerful” SC24 in a month has appeard on the sun.
Time of SC24 sunspecks will soon be over, atleast for this minimum.
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_igr/512/
There is a new cycle 24 sunspot group this morning (local time, Norway). I took this image of the new spots through my garden telescope.
http://arnholm.org/astro/sun/sc24/sun_20081011_1100ut_rot.jpg
New cycle 24 appears. Looks to be visible. Not a tiny tim.
http://www.solarcycle24.com/
Solar 24 is reporting:
“A new Cycle 24 sunspot has quickly formed high in latitude in the northern hemisphere of the sun. There is atleast 2 clearly visible flux regions along with it.”
see link above
Oh cool – a new sunspeck, actually, sunSPOT! SC24 even. Multiple pixels per spot! Maybe we’ll finally get this turkey going.
It looks like solar cycle 24 is finally kick-starting,,, a new ss24 region on the far side of the sun should rotate into view this week
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (05:26:20) :
Pretty impressive garden telescope. Umm, what’s a garden telescope? Apparently it’s not just a garden ornament.
From Kevin’s “Solar Cycle 24 Photo Timeline,” it looks like this may be the biggest Cycle 24 region yet.
http://www.solarcycle24.com/sc24.htm
Thar be hope for a min in ’08.
There is second magnetic plage region forming on the Sun’s northern-hemisphere high-latitude western-limp with a SC24 signature. No viable spots as yet.
STEREO “Behind” Image shows an even larger, even higher latitude region just now rotating into view.
http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/beacon/beacon_secchi.shtml
I monitor both ozone and neutron/cosmic ray stuff. Cosmic ray measurements are headed up, up, up! Planetary K index is also up. And a mid latitude aurora showed up. If the Sun’s magnetic field is still languishing in the basement and/or dips into the negative range, this stuff could come right at us.
Take a peak at recent neutron measures!
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/
I just checked the polarity of the solar magnetic field and it is clearly in the negative range. There is also an uptick in the solar wind. From what I have gleaned from Leif’s discussion, this condition sets up a solar magnetic route into Earth’s magnetic field, essentially linking them together. One would then expect to see a surge in cosmic ray particles getting to the measuring sites on Earth. Cool.
Pamela Gray (09:01:24) :
Cosmic ray measurements are headed up, up, up! Planetary K index is also up. And a mid latitude aurora showed up. If the Sun’s magnetic field is still languishing in the basement and/or dips into the negative range, this stuff could come right at us.
New solar activity will cause cosmic ray to come down again [with a few months lag]. The Sun’s magnetic field strength cannot go negative [ever!], and probably has hit bottom [at around a tad larger than 4 nT] by now.
I think I recall you writing back regarding one of my questions that Bz can go negative. Explain to me again what that is and your comment that cosmic rays then have a conduit. Is it the solar wind that can go negative? In either case, what would explain the sudden elevation of neutron particles?
Pamela Gray (09:27:57) :
I just checked the polarity of the solar magnetic field and it is clearly in the negative range
The polarity is just which way the field is pointing, not its strength.
There is also an uptick in the solar wind
There is one [or more] every solar rotation. The particular one today has been with us for years, faithfully returning every 27 days. When it finally dies, SC24 will be finally on its way.
From what I have gleaned from Leif’s discussion, this condition sets up a solar magnetic route into Earth’s magnetic field, essentially linking them together.
The solar wind field at large near the Earth usually points East or West [that is the polarity] depending on which side of the Heliospheric Current Sheet we are on. In addition, there are much shorter periods where the field can wobble North and South. It is when the field is pointing South that the best connection exists.
One would then expect to see a surge in cosmic ray particles getting to the measuring sites on Earth.
No, the Galactic cosmic ray flux is largely determined by the state of the whole heliosphere [not particularly near the Earth] and will decrease with solar activity picking up.
Still “cool” though.
[…] magnetic field, essentially linking them together.
The solar wind field at large near the Earth usually points […]
So MR Svalgaard. So do you think of the biggest sc24 sunspot? It seems everybody thinks that sc24 is on it way up now from this. Or we still have a longs ways to min.?
So when it is negative, it is pointing where? Please remind me of what you said about linking up or creating a hole that particles can pass through. Is it a cycle? Or does it happen without any kind of regular pattern? It seems to stay mostly positive (IE pointing elsewhere?).
Pamela Gray (09:56:20) :
I think I recall you writing back regarding one of my questions that Bz can go negative. Explain to me again what that is and your comment that cosmic rays then have a conduit.
A magnetic field is what is called a ‘vector’ quantity [unlike temperature, for instance]. Vectors have a strength and a direction [the compass needle points north – except Chinese needles that point south :-), really – no kidding]. One way to describe a vector is the give three numbers: how much of the field is pointing towards the Sun [Bx], how much along the east-west direction [By], and how much down-up (or north-south) [Bz]. Since the Earth’s field is mainly south-north, it is the Bz part that can easily connect.
The Galactic cosmic rays do not care about such tiny details and just slam into the Earth’s atmosphere with much ado. Very rarely, there will be Solar cosmic rays and those do depend on the details of the connection between the two fields.
Is it the solar wind that can go negative?
No.
In either case, what would explain the sudden elevation of neutron particles?
This is most likely an instrumental problem at Oulu.
Check Moscow tomorrow to see if they have it too. My prediction is that they will not. How is that for sticking my neck out?
[…] conduit.
A magnetic field is what is called a ‘vector’ quantity […]
My keyboard [or my old stiff fingers] seems to have a problem with a stuck SHIFT key….
Pamela Gray (09:56:20) :
In either case, what would explain the sudden elevation of neutron particles?
I have data from another station Lomnicky Stit in Slovakia. If one plots the counts from Lomnicky and Oulu [normalized to the same percentage at the left-hand half of the graph] for the past month, one gets:
http://www.leif.org/research/Pamela1.png
You can see that such jumps occur in the record [at different times a different stations]. These data are preliminary only and must be ‘cleaned up’ before publication. Plotting real-time data is always at ones own risk, and one should not overinterpret ‘mysterious’ changes. That said, it will be interesting to see the next couple of days what several stations report.
Christopher (10:25:15) :
So MR Svalgaard. So do you think of the biggest sc24 sunspot? It seems everybody thinks that sc24 is on it way up now from this. Or we still have a longs ways to min.?
At some point we should have some SC24 spots, so it is not surprising that we do. These new spots are not ‘big’ in any real sense. Whether we are a minimum is hard to say because the minimum is not a single physical thing, but depends on how you define it. That said, a minimum in, say August 2008, probably would not be far off the mark, but this is guesswork.
Pamela Gray (09:56:20) :
In either case, what would explain the sudden elevation of neutron particles
Moscow also shows no enhancement, so the jump at Oulu [there is another one today] is definitely an instrumental problem.
Pamela Gray (09:56:20) :
In either case, what would explain the sudden elevation of neutron particles
Pamela, here is the explanation:
me: Ilya,
You have a problem with the Neutron monitor counts at Oulu. October 11 and 12.
reply:
Dear Leif,
Thank you – I know the problem. I am away now, and my student interchanged the channels – pressure uncorrected data are shown since 11/10. It will be fixed tonight.
Best regards,
Ilya
Sodankyla Geophysical Observatory (Oulu unit)