Comparison of CME radial velocities from the flux rope model and the ice cream cone model

  • Published : 2011.04.15

Abstract

Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs) are enormous eruptions of plasma ejected from the Sun into interplanetary space, and mainly responsible for geomagnetic storms and solar energetic particle events. It is very important to infer their direction of propagation, speed and their 3-dimensional configurations in terms of space weather forecast. Two STEREO satellites provide us with 3-dimensional stereoscopic measurements. Using the STEREO observations, we can determine the 3-dimensional structure and radial velocity of the CME. In this study, we applied three different methods to the 2008 April 26 event: (1) Ice cream Cone Model by Xue (2005) using the SOHO/LASCO data, (2) Flux rope model by Thernisien (2009) using the STEREO/SECCHI data, (3) Flux rope model with zero angle using the STEREO/SECCHI data. The last method in which separation angle of flux rope is zero, is similar to the ice cream cone model morphologically. The comparison shows that the radial speeds from three methods are estimated to be about 750km/s and are within ${\pm}120km/s$. We will extend this comparison to other CMEs observed by STEREO and SOHO/LASCO.

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