Guest post by David Archibald
Long suspected, it seems that this has now been confirmed by a paper in Astronomy and Astrophysics with the title “Is there a planetary influence on solar activity?” by Abreu et al that was published on 22nd October, 2012.
From the Discussion and Conclusions section:
The excellent spectral agreement between the planetary tidal effects acting on the tachocline and the solar magnetic activity is
surprising, because until now the tidal coupling has been considered to be negligible. In Appendix A we show that the possibility of an accidental coincidence can be ruled out. We therefore suggest that a planetary modulation of the solar activity does take place on multidecadal to centennial time scales.
The authors note that current solar dynamo models are unable to explain the periodicities in solar activity such as the 88 year (Gleissberg), 104 year, 150 year, 208 year (de Vries), 506 year, 1000 year (Eddy) and 2200 year (Halstatt) cycles. They adopted a different view by regarding the planets and the solar dynamo as two weakly coupled non-linear systems.
The idea that planetary motions may influence solar activity seems to have been initiated by Rudolf Wolf in the 1850s. While energy considerations clearly show that the planets cannot be the direct cause of solar activity, they may perturb the solar dynamo.
Specifically, the authors calculated planetary torque at the tachocline. The tachocline of the sun is a shear layer which represents a sharp transition between two distinct rotational regimes: the differentially rotating convection zone and the almost rigidly rotating radiative interior. The tachocline plays a fundamental role in the generation and storage of the toroidal magnetic flux that eventually gives rise to solar active regions. A net tidal torque is exerted in a small region close to the tachocline due to the buoyancy frequency originating from the convection zone matching the tidal period. The tachocline is thought to be non-spherical – either prolate (watermelon-shaped) or oblate (pumpkin-shaped). The authors’ model describes planetary torques acting on a non-spherical solar tachocline.
Figure 5 from the paper shows the 10Be record, shown as modulation potential, and planetary torque in the frequency domain:
Panel a is the Fourier spectrum of the solar activity quantified by the solar modulation potential. Panel b is the Fourier spectrum of the annually averaged torque modulus. The spectra display significant peaks with very similar periodicities: The 88 year Gleissberg and the 208 year de Vries cycles are the most prominent, but periodicities around 104 years, 150 years, and 506 years are also seen.
The match between theory and the physical evidence is very, very good. As the authors put it,”there is highly statistically significant evidence for a causal relationship between the power spectra of the planetary torque on the Sun and the observed magnetic activity at the solar surface as derived from cosmogenic radionuclides.”
They also advance a plausible mechanism which is that the tachocline, playing a key role in the solar dynamo process, is a layer of strong shear which coincides more or less with the layer of overshooting convection at the bottom of the convection zone. The overshoot layer is thought to be crucial for the storage and amplification of the magnetic flux tubes that eventually erupt at the solar photosphere to form active regions. Small variations in the stratification of the overshoot zone “of about -10-4 may decide whether a flux tube becomes unstable at 2·10-4 G or at 10-5 G. This makes a great difference, because flux tubes that do not reach a strength close to 10-5 G before entering the convection zone cannot reach the solar surface as a coherent structure and therefore cannot form sunspots.” This sounds like an explanation for the Livingstone and Penn effect of fading sunspots.
Figure A.1 from the paper also shows the very good correlation between cosmogenic radionuclides from the period 300-9400 years BP and the model output:
Upper middle panel: 14C production rate derived from the INTCAL09 record
Lower middle panel: solar modulation record based on 10Be records from GRIP
(Greenland) and Dronning Maud Land (Antarctica) and the 14C production rate
Bottom panel: Calculated torque based on planetary positions
If planetary torque modulates solar activity, does solar activity in turn modulate the earth’s climate? Let’s have a look at what the 10Be record is telling us. This is the Dye 3 record from Greenland:
All the cold periods of the last six hundred years are associated with spikes in 10Be and thus low solar activity. What is also telling is that the break-over to the Modern Warm Period is associated with much lower radionuclide levels. There is a solar mechanism that explains the warming of the 20th Century. It is also seen in the Central England Temperature record as shown in the following figure:
Conclusion
This paper is a major advance in our understanding of how solar activity is modulated and in turn its effect on the earth’s climate. It can be expected that planetary torque will progress to being useful as a tool for climate prediction – for several hundred years ahead.
Reference
J.A. Abreu, J. Beer, A. Ferriz-Mas, K.G. McCracken, and F. Steinhilber, Is there a planetary influence on solar activity?” Astronomy and Astrophysics, October 22, 2012
Thanks to Geoff Sharp, the full paper can be downloaded from here.
(Note: This post was edited for title, form, and some content by Anthony Watts prior to publishing)
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Stephen Wilde says:
November 11, 2012 at 9:09 am
And, as tallbloke says, your revised solar data only affects amplitude and not the basic shape of the pattern of solar variability.
Wrong. You should not spread such misinformation.The amplitude is irrelevant [for curve fitting]. The basic shape [the background] is the all important issue and that is very different.
markx says:
November 11, 2012 at 5:44 am
“Surely it is conceivable that these effects could be of huge import where you have vast molten cores (theoretically?) producing dynamo effects and magnetospheres, and at least one molten core which is a gigantic thermonuclear reactor?”
Personally, I don’t see it. The tidal forces stretch or compress the bonds between molecules, atoms, what have you, which make up the substance being distorted. But, the bonds in molten cores, etc… are quite strong, and the tidal forces are very weak. I think you have to look at constituents which are not so tightly bound, gases and plasmas and such. And, the bulk orbital parameters themselves which can be accelerated by forces other than gravitation, e.g., from the radiation pressure I tossed out above. Even then, these things are long shots, but not, I think, impossible.
Ninderthana says:
November 11, 2012 at 5:53 am
“It is always possible that this claim may be wrong…”
Any “wrongness” is necessarily infinitesimal, even smaller than the tidal forces, which are already tiny.
Jason Wilkins says:
November 11, 2012 at 6:17 am
“Chaos was never really a satisfactory explanation.”
“Satisfactory” is a subjective judgment. Chaotic dynamics creating wideband, effectively random disturbances, feeding into a high Q resonance, is entirely satisfactory from my viewpoint.
@Stephen Fisher Wilde
More a mix of both
“More a mix of both”
Probably. But I think the component relating to the Svensmark effect is very much the smaller. We shall find out in due course.
Leif said:
“The basic shape [the background] is the all important issue and that is very different.”
I seem to have missed that. Please could you elaborate.
Ah, just noticed this:
http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-Guess.xls
Actually I think it is helpful to me because it shows the ups and down so solar activity and temperature in finer detail than previous renditions.
In particular it shows the Victorian cold spell very nicely.
Thanks Leif, but it supports my proposals better than yours 🙂
Actually Leif it shows:
i) The late 20th century warming.
ii) The mid century cooling.
iii) The early 20th century warming.
iv) the cold spell during Victorian times.
v) A mid 19th century warmer spell
vi) The cold spell around 1812 which defeated the Napoleonic armies.
etc. etc.
In fact the shape of your latest iteration is better than ever from my point of view. The amplitude being pretty much irrelevant.
If you carry on as you are you might well produce an even more accurate mirror of past warming and cooling periods.
Leif Svalgaard says:
November 11, 2012 at 8:13 am
The D/0 cycles or bonds events are the best idea why the Arctic and Antarctic behave in opposite steps. Much milder versions/mechanisms of these events before the threshold is reached probably explains why the poles even now show signs of opposite behavior.
Should have added to my above post. (Nov 11, 2012 at 11:11 am)
I would have thought the best explanation for what causes these d/o cycles or bonds events rely on the solar variance over thousands of years. Changing the amount of energy reaching above 65N and below 65S affecting global ice and cloud albedo over the planet.
Wilde.
Since you have never produced a single quantified hypothesis or statement, that is, sicne you have never said or written anything that is testable or falsifiable, I find it hilarious that you argue that data agrees with your position. You have no position. No theory. No quantified account of anything. There isnt any data anyone could trot out that would prove you right or wrong. In fact, all data agrees with your position because your position is vacuous and un quantifed. And no data agree with your position for the same reason.
Leif
“As one can represent almost any function by the sum of a number of sine waves, ”
dont expose their dirty little secret.
The Central England temps vs Dye 3Be10 graph looks like an Excel. You can colour-code your data by date of data. You may well see a circularity in the data, ie. an internal, “swirling” pattern that reflects a change of process with a time-dependent variable
If this variable is present, your linear interpretation is incomplete except as a second or third level effect.
Not saying it is. But the data distribution needs to be analyzed further.
It is regrettable that the Spanish/Swiss authors of this paper do not see fit to discuss or reference the work by DeJager and Duhau on the tachocline
http://www.cdejager.com/sun-earth-publications/
which shows a cyclic system of transition points between the poloidal and toroidal magnetic fields, nor do they include any mention of the work of Charvatova and several other, with its emphasis on orbital SIM movements.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/59135553/Charvatova-Brazil%208-%2710.ppt
The interesting and challenging coincidence of the 178.7 year cycle of both should warrant some attention and research.
I am not an admirer of this sort of research myopia.
Leif,
Shouldn’t TSI that is shaded from the Earth also be measured above the poles because long term cycles affect the amount that reach them. This is another variable that does change, but can’t be detected by the current position where TSI is recorded.
Steven Mosher says:
“There isnt any data anyone could trot out that would prove you right or wrong. In fact, all data agrees with your position because your position is vacuous and un quantifed. And no data agree with your position for the same reason.”
Funny, you could say exactly the same thing about AGW. If I’m wrong, then ‘trot out’ your empirical evidence showing conclusively that AGW exists.
Its nice to see we are all playing nicely!
“Taking into account the relative masses involved I presume it is the SSBC which moves about the sun, although all (?) the published diagrams seem to show the sun moving in relation to the solar system barycenter. ”
The barycentre calculation _includes_ the sun. It’s all of the solar system, not just the planets.
Having said that I don’t see why anything in a system more complex than a two body system would rotate about the barycentre (centre of mass). Planetary movements are determined by gravity , not mass. Centre of mass is determined by distance and gravity by the square of separation.
The centre of mass is not the centre of gravitational attraction.
As Steve Goddard pointed out recently the Earth-Moon system rotates around the Sun not the SS barycentre.
In fact it would be more accurate to work out where the centre of gravitational attraction of all other bodies on the Earth_Moon is, as that will be the point about which we rotate. What he showed is that this is much nearer to the centre of the sun than it is to the barycentre.
The centre of gravitational attraction is different for every object, not just because its own mass has to be taken out of the calculation but because it depends on its relative position to all the other bodies.
I’m not sure what the barycentre is useful for, but working out orbits is not it.
NaturalCyclist @ur momisugly November 11, 2012 at 2:16 am
Thanks for posting the link to Joseph Postma’s paper A Discussion on the Absence of a Measurable Greenhouse Effect. It is rare in my experience to find an author who writes mathematical equations in understandable English.
From page 16
This heat energy will then conduct its way down into the subsurface until it merges with the
geothermal temperature at a depth of somewhere around, say, 5 to 10 meters and temperature of
approximately 5C to 10C (the author has not been able to find reliable data to reference these values.)
The following temperature data set from Dome A in Antarctica measures ice temperatures in the sub-surface down to 10 metres. The annual effect of thermal lag can be clearly seen in these data.
http://www.antarctica.gov.au/about-antarctica/fact-files/weather/automatic-weather-stations/dome-a-details
Albert Jacobs says: “The interesting and challenging coincidence of the 178.7 year cycle of both should warrant some attention and research.”
It is interesting to note that if one looks at the difference between hadSST3 and ICOADS from which it is derived, the main component of what is removed is a cycle of 184 years.
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/hadsst3-cosine-fit1.png
Just one of those odd coincidences, I suppose.
That is also somewhat shorter than the circa 220y “principal component” that Thomson , Denis et al found in the Gomez ice core at the base of the Antarctic peninsula.
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/gomez_d18o2.png
tallbloke says:
November 10, 2012 at 11:19 am
The Sun is not in perfect freefall because of the quadrupolar moments which arise due to it’s irregular shape.
The quadrupole moment is exceedingly small and does not make the sun deviate from free fall. An astronaut in orbit has a very irregular shape and is still in free fall.
I’m afraid I don’t get the point of this entire sequence. No extended object in the gravitational field of another is in “perfect freefall”. Hence the tides. In the specific case of the Sun, the center of mass of the solar system, about which the Sun orbits, moves around from the center two within around 2 solar radii, spending almost all of its time not particularly close to the center.. There are some lovely pictures (and other considerations discussed) here:
http://www.timingsolution.com/TS/Study/cm/
It should be pretty clear from the motion of the solar system CM through the sun that all of the sun is not in freefall about the CM. In fact, quite a lot of the time (when the CM is inside of the sun and the sun is rotation) most of the sun is not “in freefall”. If I recall from reading stuff a very long time ago, the Gleissberg cycle is fairly closely tied to aspects of the solar orbit around the CM of the solar system, which fluctuates significantly according to the “beats” in the orbits of (principally) Jupiter, Saturn and the other planets. However, the orbit and motion is nearly chaotic, occasionally going retrograde!
This site also shows full well the peril of post hoc ergo propter hoc reasoning. Note well the lovely correlation between the mean radius of the SSCM and the rate of inflation!
So unless I have completely lost my mind, almost no part of the Sun is ever in freefall any more than most of the Earth, Moon, Jupiter, etc are in freefall. Tidal forces are indeed the pseudoforces caused by the near impossibility of an extended body all being in freefall when moving in the influence of other gravitational bodies.
rgb
It would be great as an experiment to find two similar stars, one with planets and one without planets and have the ability to observe the difference of activity on those stars.
We can detect whether a star has planets, how would we detect a sun spot cycle on a nearby star without observing the spots? Radio?
Leif Svalgaard says:
November 11, 2012 at 9:26 am
Is this SORCE/TIM reconstruction the latest word Leif?
http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce/total_solar_irradiance_plots/tim_tsi_reconstruction_2012.jpeg
No. And it is not a SORCE/TIM reconstruction. It is Greg Kopp’s. The problem with this and similar ones is the [unwarranted and unsupported] assumption that there is a background level given by the cycle average of the Group Sunspot Number [which itself is flawed]: http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-Background-Not.png
Their plot is dated 2012 so it’s unlikely they didn’t get the memo yet. Maybe *SHOCK HORROR* they just don’t agree with your ironing flat of the solar data.
Thanks for the Not-plot, very interesting. Can the L&P effect be ruled out as a contributing factor to the reduction in group sunspot numbers?
Sparks says:
November 11, 2012 at 1:12 pm
It would be great as an experiment to find two similar stars, one with planets and one without planets and have the ability to observe the difference of activity on those stars.
There a lots of stars with planets in all kinds of distances. So far, no star has been found with activity with periods matching planets outside of the sonic point: http://www.leif.org/research/AGU%20Fall%202011%20SH34B-08.pdf slide 19
rgbatduke says:
November 11, 2012 at 12:59 pm
No extended object in the gravitational field of another is in “perfect freefall”. Hence the tides.
The word ‘perfect’ has no place in science. It is always a matter of degree. What counts is the deviation from free fall [and that is exceedingly small]. Tides have nothing to do with this.
Dan in Nevada says:
November 10, 2012 at 11:10 am
“This is pretty interesting. To the extent this pans out it would appear to bolster Svensmark’s GCR cloud hypothesis if I’m understanding correctly. Leif pointed out the extent to which this would be a “butterfly effect” if true (my paraphrase, apologies if I misunderstood). ”
“Butterfly effect” means the amplification of disturbances in a chaotic system. It would not be the right term for the Svensmark mechanism. The Svensmark mechanism can be described as such:
The chaotic weather system of the Earth is synchronized by the outside influence of GCR strength. So, it would no longer be a freely oscillating chaotic system but a synchronized chaotic oscillator. – a coupled system.
If the influencing system is highly regular, this could allow long term predictions of average temperature. The IPCC models assume that the Earth’s climate is NOT synchronized by an outside system and therefore they cannot make predictions (yet they behave as if their scenarios were predictions. They are not, and cannot be for the chaotic nature of their models. It is not possible to do long range predictions of the state of a chaotic system with a model with finite precision, especially not when you start with a random state – which they do.).
tallbloke says:
November 11, 2012 at 1:44 pm
Their plot is dated 2012 so it’s unlikely they didn’t get the memo yet. Maybe *SHOCK HORROR* they just don’t agree with your ironing flat of the solar data.
They just splice the recent TIM to the obsolete Lean 2000 reconstruction. This is wrong no matter how you cut it.
Thanks for the Not-plot, very interesting. Can the L&P effect be ruled out as a contributing factor to the reduction in group sunspot numbers?
The L&P effect has nothing to do with why the Group sunspot number is too low before 1882. The reason for that is that Hoyt and Schatten got the k-factors wrong. Even Schatten now agrees with that. Here is an analysis of what is wrong the GSN [and how to fix it]: http://www.leif.org/research/What-is-Wrong-with-GSN.pdf
It is the opinion of the SSN-workshop that GSN is wrong and should not be used anymore. It will take some time before that filters out to our user community, because the conclusion invalidates many correlations and presumed causations, to wit: your own silly resistance.