I got a tip by email from JohnA who runs solarscience.auditblogs.com about this NASA press release. John’s skeptical about it. He makes some good points in this post here.
What I most agree with JohnA’s post is about sunspots. While we’ve seen some small rumblings that the solar dynamo might be on the upswing, such as watching Leif’s plot of the 10.7 CM solar radio flux, there just doesn’t appear to be much change in character of the sunspots during the last year. And the magnetic field strength just doesn’t seem to be ramping up much.
He writes:
“Let’s check out the window”
On Solarcycle24.com they’ve got yet another sun speck recorded yesterday, that by today had disappeared. Exactly the same behaviour we’ve been having for 12 months with no end in sight.
I agree with JohnA, it’s still a bit slow out there. Leif is at the conference in Boulder where NASA made this announcement below, so perhaps he’ll fill us in on the details.
Here is the NASA story:
Mystery of the Missing Sunspots, Solved?
June 17, 2009: The sun is in the pits of a century-class solar minimum, and sunspots have been puzzlingly scarce for more than two years. Now, for the first time, solar physicists might understand why.
At an American Astronomical Society press conference today in Boulder, Colorado, researchers announced that a jet stream deep inside the sun is migrating slower than usual through the star’s interior, giving rise to the current lack of sunspots.
Rachel Howe and Frank Hill of the National Solar Observatory (NSO) in Tucson, Arizona, used a technique called helioseismology to detect and track the jet stream down to depths of 7,000 km below the surface of the sun. The sun generates new jet streams near its poles every 11 years, they explained to a room full of reporters and fellow scientists. The streams migrate slowly from the poles to the equator and when a jet stream reaches the critical latitude of 22 degrees, new-cycle sunspots begin to appear.
Above: A helioseismic map of the solar interior. Tilted red-yellow bands trace solar jet streams. Black contours denote sunspot activity. When the jet streams reach a critical latitude around 22 degrees, sunspot activity intensifies. [larger image] [more graphics]
Howe and Hill found that the stream associated with the next solar cycle has moved sluggishly, taking three years to cover a 10 degree range in latitude compared to only two years for the previous solar cycle.
The jet stream is now, finally, reaching the critical latitude, heralding a return of solar activity in the months and years ahead.
“It is exciting to see”, says Hill, “that just as this sluggish stream reaches the usual active latitude of 22 degrees, a year late, we finally begin to see new groups of sunspots emerging.”
he current solar minimum has been so long and deep, it prompted some scientists to speculate that the sun might enter a long period with no sunspot activity at all, akin to the Maunder Minimum of the 17th century. This new result dispells those concerns. The sun’s internal magnetic dynamo is still operating, and the sunspot cycle is not “broken.”
Because it flows beneath the surface of the sun, the jet stream is not directly visible. Hill and Howe tracked its hidden motions via helioseismology. Shifting masses inside the sun send pressure waves rippling through the stellar interior. So-called “p modes” (p for pressure) bounce around the interior and cause the sun to ring like an enormous bell. By studying the vibrations of the sun’s surface, it is possible to figure out what is happening inside. Similar techniques are used by geologists to map the interior of our planet.
In this case, researchers combined data from GONG and SOHO. GONG, short for “Global Oscillation Network Group,” is an NSO-led network of telescopes that measures solar vibrations from various locations around Earth. SOHO, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, makes similar measurements from Earth orbit.
“This is an important discovery,” says Dean Pesnell of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. “It shows how flows inside the sun are tied to the creation of sunspots and how jet streams can affect the timing of the solar cycle.”
There is, however, much more to learn.
“We still don’t understand exactly how jet streams trigger sunspot production,” says Pesnell. “Nor do we fully understand how the jet streams themselves are generated.”
To solve these mysteries, and others, NASA plans to launch the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) later this year. SDO is equipped with sophisticated helioseismology sensors that will allow it to probe the solar interior better than ever before.
Right: An artist’s concept of the Solar Dynamics Observatory. [more]
“The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) on SDO will improve our understanding of these jet streams and other internal flows by providing full disk images at ever-increasing depths in the sun,” says Pesnell.
Continued tracking and study of solar jet streams could help researchers do something unprecedented–accurately predict the unfolding of future solar cycles. Stay tuned for that!
The entire release has the ring of desperation. Reeks of it. The kings soothsayers are desperately trying to explain why their spells are broken. To no avail. Now it sounds like they’re just making stuff up. My 3yr old buys these sorts of explanations. Sometimes. Mom? Not so much.
I almost feel sorry for them. Almost. Those of us with careers involving scientific research have all suffered through presentations where the speaker was grossly unprepared. This sort of explanation would have just chummed the waters. I can only imagine what my dissertation director would have done had I stood before my committee and uttered such. LOL. Chummed the waters indeedy… It would have been a dreadfully long and miserable afternoon. For me anyways.
The paragraph AEgeneral and others objects to should never have found its way into *any* scientific paper. Much less one subsidized by my tax dollars. I’ve cleaned *less* smelly dirty diapers. This morning in fact.
“Spheromak”
The flux tubes that run below the sun’s surface currently have low current running through them. This has relaxed the electric field of the flux tube and thus the magnetic field, around those tubes. The tube is one long tube, similar to a rubber band that is doubled or tripled up.
Think of it as a ‘spheromak’, a device that is used to fuel tokamaks and is also a stable toroidal plasma configuration that has its own toroidal and poloidal fields. If we allow the spheromak to double or triple up like the rubber band, this is one way to look at what is going on with the lack of sun spots and how those spots even come to be.
During times of higher sunspot activity, these flux tubes have much more plasms current running through them and experience ‘helicity’ which in turn provides resistance to the plasma current running through those tubes. That excess is drained off in the form of CMEs which rebalance the current and resistance (helicity), by releasing those areas of high plasma density in a rather explosive manner called a Coronal Mass Ejection.
This helicity allows plasma to drag magnetic field lines away from the flux tubes which causes a magnetic bubble in a sense. These bubbles are the sunspots. Once the plasma pressure exceeds the resistive helicity of the flux tube system, less resistance is seen at the base of the bubbled up field, the path from the bases has less resistance between then versus through the length of the tube. The base then shorts out, blasting plasma and field lines away from the sun. The “sigmoid” that develops tells you that the helicity is really high and get ready for a blamo event.
Rarely occasionally, during heighten solar activity, we see donut shaped toroids or smoke-ring looking configurations during CMEs (not these newly declared “crescents” or “croissants”, but complete ring shaped donuts). This is the blasted off field lines re-connecting onto a circular toroidal current (or spheromak).
So, if the magnetic field strengths are low, there will be very few sunspots (or specks) because there is low current running through these flux tubes and the plasma current is not dense enough to extrude field lines.
All of this is very easily demonstrable by twisting a computer mouse cord and wacthing what the twisting does to the shape. It causes a loop to form that looks like subtended field lines that are ready to blow. It forms an omega shape where the base of the two sides are closer together (less resistive path) than the path through the loop to the other side of the base.
I am not a scientist but plasma configurations really interest me. I ask you intelligent people to look into what a “spheromak” is.
Go to the Swarthmore Spheromak Experiment: http://plasma.swarthmore.edu/SSX/index.html
What does a spheromak look like? http://plasma.swarthmore.edu/SSX/formation/spheromakexplain.jpeg
The now dead Cheshire Sunspot #1021 continues to rack-up a score of 11 as of this post. We have seen the goalpost moved multiple times, the goalpost has been lowered, the game clock stopped and now any ball can be used in the game. What’s next, performance enhancing drugs for solar astronomers and astrophysicists? On second through, given some of the pronouncements coming out of NASA and SWPC lately this may already be a problem.
I have been thinking about what a Livingston & Penn event will look like statistically where the referee is crooked and every Cheshire Spot and sun-pore is going to be counted as a real sunspot. We will see the monthly average sunspot number raise to about 10 and then plateau there unless multiple events start occurring at the same time. Look at the red “Sunspot number” line on this image to see what I am talking about and note #1021 to the extreme right which is now running up the score.
http://www.solen.info/solar/images/solar.gif
In another bit of bad news, it appears that the SOHO MDI Magnetogram imaging system is again MIA; that will be a loss if this continues.
Mike
Geoff Sharpe turn us on to these folks a\
\]
Instructive write up. Geoff Sharpe started writing on Howe’s results a couple of months ago, but the ‘jet stream’ simile makes it clearer to this layman. This is the result of baroclinic forces arising from shear at the tachocline.
I predict we have a winner(along with Livingston and Penn) in the Heliophysics sweeps for 24. The polar fields, Shatten, et al., will now decline in interest as an effect.
Why not wait until F10.7 is back up to a monthly average of 75, and see that the spots look like then. Will we see bigger spots, or just tiny spots which last all month – or till the relation between Rz and F10.7 be significantly altered? At the moment, the sunspot count is not usefully different to zero and it’s hard to tell if the detail of the count has any interest – particularly when there are other measurements which give easier indications of the location of the mimimum…
Sorry for the mess, baby was assisting.
“The current solar minimum has been so long and deep, it prompted some scientists to speculate that the sun might enter a long period with no sunspot activity at all, akin to the Maunder Minimum of the 17th century. This new result dispells those concerns. The sun’s internal magnetic dynamo is still operating, and the sunspot cycle is not “broken.”
What postulate that the solar dynamo didn’t work during the Maunder Minimum? Maybe the sunspot forming magnetic fields were to weak to reseach the surface in the same way as they are now. Now nearly all we get are solar plages.
Mom2girls 6:21:12
A great comment. Now, wouldn’t it be cool if that baby could tell what was running through Mom’s mind as she changed the diaper? It won’t be long and she will be able to think like you.
===================================
It is my opinion that these ‘scientists’ have reverted to the psychology of a doomed cultist tirbe; if they just offer enough sincere group thought and interpretation of God’s will through the reading of the latest tea leaves, they can affect change in something they don’t truely understand, just by collectively wishing it so.
It appears as though they are engaging this mentality on several fronts; AGW propter hoc CO2, Solar Cycle anomalies, ice shelf collapse, etc. The depth of the sickness is manifest in their willingness to corrupt the data to conform to their beliefs, and even misinterpret the data as necassary; i.e. lowering the standards for a sunspot in order to produce more sunspots. (This will surely be pleasing to the Gods.)
Usually in these scenarious, at some point, someone with intelligent understanding arrives to find the entire cult has a) starved to death, b) all died of some mysterious disease for which modern science has provided a simple cure or c) are all completely naked for reasons incomprehensible to the newly arrived and uninitiated conferee.
Either way, it will surely provide future psychologists will copious amounts of material for case study. Imagine the paper; ‘The AGW cult; group hypnosis in the scientific community.’ I would be willing to lay down a little cash that that article (or close approximation) will appear in Psychology Today, American Journal of Psych, or the British Journal of Psych. within the next 15 years.
Mike,
Region 1021 was visible toward the end of the day and on the 16th, and the MDI image around 22z showed it, but SWPC did not count it in their daily tally. Should we complain about that? Or that the limb proximity of Region 1021 is bad now so the sunspot might not be gone, just unable to be seen. When does it end ?
That is a particularly strange report. It reminds me of being in elementary school and being told that plants grow by photosynthesis. As if that label really explains anything. Explain this process to us. Is there really causation established? And even so, do we know if this happened during the Dalton? Is there really any reason to celebrate yet?
It is suddenly very disconcerting that NASA is so obviously actively hoping for a fast ramp-up for cycle 24. Why do they really care?
“solar jetstream” ugh. Am I wrong to think that whoever coined that term suffers from a lack of imagination? As far as I’m concerned the great “greenhouse” metaphor creates as much misapprehension as comprehension. Are we headed in a similar direction with talk of solar jetstreams?
Whatever is the cause of this minimum I don’t think anyone is going to be able to explain it and I doubt even more that a prediction can be made of when it will end. We don’t have enough data nor a computer simulation accurate enough to produce a match of history let alone good enough to project forward. You first have to match historical behavior before you can predict the future. We can’t forecast the weather or the economy now what makes you think we can forecast the sun’s weather? NASA is looking like a bunch of fools with this one and they know it. Some politician said we need to quiet the pitchforks with some data. Now back to standing on your heads. (little humor)
Just to throw my $.02 worth into the mix, from reading the release & looking at the helioseismic map, they are focusing in the wrong area of the map. All of the talk is toward the ‘jet stream’ close to the equator of the sun. However, looking at the helioseismic map with the sunspot plots overlayed, the sunspots seem to be more closely related to the ‘polar jet stream’ (PJS) than to the ‘equatorial jet stream’ (EJS).
If you look at the very right edge of the plot, at the high latitudes (above 60 deg), the previous PJS is migrating toward the poles, off the chart, and the sunspots from the previous cycle are winding down. There is a roughly 2 year ‘quiet’ period till a new PJS begins to form at around the 50 deg area and the sunspots begin to grow in intensity as the PJS intensifies as well until, at the end of this latest cycle, the PJS migrates up to the polar regions and dissaprears. As the PJS is too close to the poles, the sunspots fade away. There has been no new PJS formation anywhere around the upper mid-latitudes and the sunspots have been very quiet.
Also, if you notice at the left side of the map, the latitude ‘width’ of the equtorial region is quite wide (nearly 120 deg in latitude) whereas now, that width of the region is only 80 deg wide…that is a 40 deg shrinkage. The areas from approx 40 deg lat up towards the poles is *very* quiet.
My prediction is that until a new area of mid-latitude (>40 deg) enhancement begins to form & move toward the polar region, the sunspot activity will continue to remain suppressed.
I would like to see a longer plot of helioseismic maps from past cycles to see if there is a corrolation to my observations.
Regards,
Jeff
“If you look at the very right edge of the plot, at the high latitudes…”
Duh…correction; that should read…
“If you look at the very *left* edge of the plot, at the high latitudes…”
Sorry ’bout dat!
Jeff
What a coincidence? 22 degrees is the same angle as the angle for halos around the sun.
It seems like very small sunspots such as the one numbered 1021 yesterday may not have even been noticed with equipment available during previous minimums such as the maunder, dalton, etc. Can anyone fill me in on how we know we are comparing apples to apples?
If there is some truth to this “sluggish solar jet stream” theory, could it mean that when the jet stream is sluggish, the cycles only produce these small spots that may have passed without notice in the early 1700’s and early 1800’s. The minimum would have been perceived as very long, because there was no discernible maximum (at the time).
I would be interested if anyone could point me to any background on this.
If I may respond to NASA’s statement.
“I still don’t fully understand how CO2 triggers global warming. No do I fully understand how Hansen’s temperature streams are generated.”
Speaking as a former statistician, I cannot conceive that even the best intentioned person, could maintain an accurate database of numbers when 75% of their data stream has been eliminated since 1990. The utter refusal to use alternative data sources such as UAH simply boggles the mind.
When I worked for the government, I felt it was my duty to provide as accurate a number as I could to keep the politicians honest. They couldn’t say employment and wages were going up, if they were going down. Integrity of the data is all that stands truth and propaganda.
Mr. Hansen if your cause is true the numbers will show it. People who do right welcome the light shining on their work. The fact you keep your work hidden, speaks of cowardice and knavery. If these charges offend, show forth your work and prove me wrong.
Trying to predict the suns internal movements is equivalent to gazing at the hairs on your arm and telling the second on the left past that ‘spot’ to stand up strait.
NASA always was a political organization “No bucks no Buck Rodgers”-a line for the movie “The Right Stuff.”-about a time when we weren’t afraid of our own shadow or carbon footprint.This is all about funding,and the ability to keep NASA in business.
However looking for the cycle 24 ramp-up is becoming like looking for the Christmas
Pony in the pile of Horse Manure…
BTW-Lief-what is this “Jet Stream” thing? and what if anything does it do with the
well known ‘Solar Conveyor’?…
Kath (22:38:16) :
I don’t see any signs of a start of new jetstreams at +-50 degrees. Assuming that the previous cycle is repeatable of course. If it’s repeatable, we should also be seeing numerous cycle 23 spots at the moment.
Whats interesting to me are the colors. More yellow in the “jet stream” as it approaches the equator. Is that more “ringing” or less. And in the last cycle the navy blue grouping just inside the “stream” increases in area as the V narrows. Is the interior being condensed until it blows out as a sun spot?
Anthony and moderators, have you seen this one yet?
http://noteviljustwrong.com/blog/9-general/104-republicans-and-their-st-films-must-be-stopped.html
@ur momisugly George Varros (06:34:31):
You are on the right track, the Sun is electrical in nature, being constituted of 99.9% plasma, charged particles. As I suspect you know, plasma is ‘quasi neutral’ , that is, while being overall neutral (an equal number of electrons and ions), it seperates into differentiated regions of charge, seperated by double layers.
Your construction reflects the scientific observations & measurments made of the Sun.
I have several points: You mention “current” several times, but don’t say, “electrical current”, is that intentional?
You state: “This helicity allows plasma to drag magnetic field lines away from the flux tubes which causes a magnetic bubble in a sense.”
Do you mean the electric current of the plasma changes and the magnetic fields follow the new paths of electric current?
You state: “The base then shorts out, blasting plasma and field lines away from the sun.”
Do you mean the double layer short circuits causing the double layer to explode, driving plasma away from the Sun which in turn froms a new set of magnetic fields which reflects new patterns of electron movement or flow?
You mention a “sigmoid”, do you subscribe to the idea that a sigmoid is electrical in nature?
You mention, “[magnetic] field lines”, do you consider “field lines” as a conceptual aid that maps a “field” of undifferentiated continuum of magnetic strength?
The Sun when more active than now has a plasma torus, a “donut” of plasma as your schematic indicates, this has been observed & measured, there is no scientific dispute about the existence of this structure.
Coronal Mass Ejections (CME) become magnetic field aligned electric currents of plasma (Birkeland currents) that flow to the
Earth causing large electrical disturbances in the Earth’s atmosphere, the aurora (indeed, this is an addition to the Earth’s total energy budget that needs to be taken into account).
The sooner scientists start dealing with the electrical structure of the Sun, the closer they might be to predicting it (“might” is the operative word).
But you don’t have a chance to predict something until you have a grasp of its physical structure and processes.
This issue is for Geoff Sharp. Why?, see:
The results indicate that `solar dynamo’ that was long sought in the solar interior, operates more likely from the outside, by means of the varying planetary configurations. As has been shown in Charva tova (1995a, b, c, 1997a), the solar motion could aid predictions also for terrestrial phe-
nomena including climate.
http://www.giurfa.com/charvatova.pdf
“Please, don’t panic”
What was the question again?