Andrea Diercke

• Filaments are omnipresent features in the solar chromosphere, one of the atmospheric layers of the Sun, which is located above the photosphere, the visible surface of the Sun. They are clouds of plasma reaching from the photosphere to the chromosphere, and even to the outer-most atmospheric layer, the corona. They are stabalized by the magnetic field. If the magnetic field is disturbed, filaments can erupt as coronal mass ejections (CME), releasing plasma into space, which can also hit the Earth. A special type of filaments are polar crown filaments, which form at the interface of the unipolar field of the poles and flux of opposite magnetic polarity, which was transported towards the poles. This flux transport is related to the global dynamo of the Sun and can therefore be analyzed indirectly with polar crown filaments. The main objective of this thesis is to better understand the physical properties and environment of high-latitude and polar crown filaments, which can be approached from two perspectives: (1) analyzing theFilaments are omnipresent features in the solar chromosphere, one of the atmospheric layers of the Sun, which is located above the photosphere, the visible surface of the Sun. They are clouds of plasma reaching from the photosphere to the chromosphere, and even to the outer-most atmospheric layer, the corona. They are stabalized by the magnetic field. If the magnetic field is disturbed, filaments can erupt as coronal mass ejections (CME), releasing plasma into space, which can also hit the Earth. A special type of filaments are polar crown filaments, which form at the interface of the unipolar field of the poles and flux of opposite magnetic polarity, which was transported towards the poles. This flux transport is related to the global dynamo of the Sun and can therefore be analyzed indirectly with polar crown filaments. The main objective of this thesis is to better understand the physical properties and environment of high-latitude and polar crown filaments, which can be approached from two perspectives: (1) analyzing the large-scale properties of high-latitude and polar crown filaments with full-disk Hα observations from the Chromospheric Telescope (ChroTel) and (2) determining the relation of polar crown and high-latitude filaments from the chromosphere to the lower-lying photosphere with high-spatial resolution observations of the Vacuum Tower Telescope (VTT), which reveal the smallest details. The Chromospheric Telescope (ChroTel) is a small 10-cm robotic telescope at Observatorio del Teide on Tenerife (Spain), which observes the entire Sun in Hα, Ca IIK, and He I 10830 Å. We present a new calibration method that includes limb-darkening correction, removal of non-uniform filter transmission, and determination of He I Doppler velocities. Chromospheric full-disk filtergrams are often obtained with Lyot filters, which may display non-uniform transmission causing large-scale intensity variations across the solar disk. Removal of a 2D symmetric limb-darkening function from full-disk images results in a flat background. However, transmission artifacts remain and are even more distinct in these contrast-enhanced images. Zernike polynomials are uniquely appropriate to fit these large-scale intensity variations of the background. The Zernike coefficients show a distinct temporal evolution for ChroTel data, which is likely related to the telescope’s alt-azimuth mount that introduces image rotation. In addition, applying this calibration to sets of seven filtergrams that cover the He I triplet facilitates determining chromospheric Doppler velocities. To validate the method, we use three datasets with varying levels of solar activity. The Doppler velocities are benchmarked with respect to co-temporal high-resolution spectroscopic data of the GREGOR Infrared Spectrograph (GRIS). Furthermore, this technique can be applied to ChroTel Hα and Ca IIK data. The calibration method for ChroTel filtergrams can be easily adapted to other full-disk data exhibiting unwanted large-scale variations. The spectral region of the He I triplet is a primary choice for high-resolution near-infrared spectropolarimetry. Here, the improved calibration of ChroTel data will provide valuable context data. Polar crown filaments form above the polarity inversion line between the old magnetic flux of the previous cycle and the new magnetic flux of the current cycle. Studying their appearance and their properties can lead to a better understanding of the solar cycle. We use full-disk data of the ChroTel at Observatorio del Teide, Tenerife, Spain, which were taken in three different chromospheric absorption lines (Hα 6563 Å, Ca IIK 3933 Å, and He I 10830 Å), and we create synoptic maps. In addition, the spectroscopic He I data allow us to compute Doppler velocities and to create synoptic Doppler maps. ChroTel data cover the rising and decaying phase of Solar Cycle 24 on about 1000 days between 2012 and 2018. Based on these data, we automatically extract polar crown filaments with image-processing tools and study their properties. We compare contrast maps of polar crown filaments with those of quiet-Sun filaments. Furthermore, we present a super-synoptic map summarizing the entire ChroTel database. In summary, we provide statistical properties, i.e. number and location of filaments, area, and tilt angle for both the maximum and declining phase of Solar Cycle 24. This demonstrates that ChroTel provides a promising dataset to study the solar cycle. The cyclic behavior of polar crown filaments can be monitored by regular full-disk Hα observations. ChroTel provides such regular observations of the Sun in three chromospheric wavelengths. To analyze the cyclic behavior and the statistical properties of polar crown filaments, we have to extract the filaments from the images. Manual extraction is tedious, and extraction with morphological image processing tools produces a large number of false positive detections and the manual extraction of these takes too much time. Automatic object detection and extraction in a reliable manner allows us to process more data in a shorter time. We will present an overview of the ChroTel database and a proof of concept of a machine learning application, which allows us a unified extraction of, for example, filaments from ChroTel data. The chromospheric Hα spectral line dominates the spectrum of the Sun and other stars. In the stellar regime, this spectral line is already used as a powerful tracer of magnetic activity. For the Sun, other tracers are typically used to monitor solar activity. Nonetheless, the Sun is observed constantly in Hα with globally distributed ground-based full-disk imagers. The aim of this study is to introduce Hα as a tracer of solar activity and compare it to other established indicators. We discuss the newly created imaging Hα excess in the perspective of possible application for modelling of stellar atmospheres. In particular, we try to determine how constant is the mean intensity of the Hα excess and number density of low-activity regions between solar maximum and minimum. Furthermore, we investigate whether the active region coverage fraction or the changing emission strength in the active regions dominates time variability in solar Hα observations. We use ChroTel observations of full-disk Hα filtergrams and morphological image processing techniques to extract the positive and negative imaging Hα excess, for bright features (plage regions) and dark absorption features (filaments and sunspots), respectively. We describe the evolution of the Hα excess during Solar Cycle 24 and compare it to other well established tracers: the relative sunspot number, the F10.7 cm radio flux, and the Mg II index. Moreover, we discuss possible applications of the Hα excess for stellar activity diagnostics and the contamination of exoplanet transmission spectra. The positive and negative Hα excess follow the behavior of the solar activity over the course of the cycle. Thereby, positive Hα excess is closely correlated to the chromospheric Mg II index. On the other hand, the negative Hα excess, created from dark features like filaments and sunspots, is introduced as a tracer of solar activity for the first time. We investigated the mean intensity distribution for active regions for solar minimum and maximum and found that the shape of both distributions is very similar but with different amplitudes. This might be related with the relatively stable coronal temperature component during the solar cycle. Furthermore, we found that the coverage fraction of Hα excess and the Hα excess of bright features are strongly correlated, which will influence modelling of stellar and exoplanet atmospheres. High-resolution observations of polar crown and high-latitude filaments are scarce. We present a unique sample of such filaments observed in high-resolution Hα narrow-band filtergrams and broad-band images, which were obtained with a new fast camera system at the VTT. ChroTel provided full-disk context observations in Hα, Ca IIK, and He I 10830 Å. The Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) and the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) on board the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) provided line-of-sight magnetograms and ultraviolet (UV) 1700 Å filtergrams, respectively. We study filigree in the vicinity of polar crown and high-latitude filaments and relate their locations to magnetic concentrations at the filaments’ footpoints. Bright points are a well studied phenomenon in the photosphere at low latitudes, but they were not yet studied in the quiet network close to the poles. We examine size, area, and eccentricity of bright points and find that their morphology is very similar to their counterparts at lower latitudes, but their sizes and areas are larger. Bright points at the footpoints of polar crown filaments are preferentially located at stronger magnetic flux concentrations, which are related to bright regions at the border of supergranules as observed in UV filtergrams. Examining the evolution of bright points on three consecutive days reveals that their amount increases while the filament decays, which indicates they impact the equilibrium of the cool plasma contained in filaments.…
• Filamente sind omnipräsente Strukturen in der Chromosphäre der Sonne. Diese Schicht befindet sich über der Photosphäre, welche die sichtbare Oberfläche der Sonne darstellt. Filamente sind Plasmagebilde, welche in der Photosphäre verankert sind und von der Chromosphäre in die Korona reichen, der äußersten Atmosphärenschicht der Sonne. Diese Strukturen werden durch das Magnetfeld der Sonne stabilisiert. Durch Störungen des Magnetfelds, destabilisiert sich das Filament und das dort enthaltene Plasma kann als Sonneneruption, ein sogenannter koronaler Massenauswurf, ins Weltall geschleudert werden, welcher auch die Erde treffen könnte. Das Verständnis von Filamenten, deren Stabilität und Verbindung zum Magnetfeld sind ungemein wichtig, um Sonneneruptionen besser verstehen und vorhersagen zu können. Ein spezieller Typ von Filamenten, sind polare Filamente, (engl. polar crown filaments). Diese bilden sich an der Grenzfläche des unipolaren Magnetfelds an den Polen und dem Magnetfeld von gemischten Polaritäten in den Aktivitätsgürteln derFilamente sind omnipräsente Strukturen in der Chromosphäre der Sonne. Diese Schicht befindet sich über der Photosphäre, welche die sichtbare Oberfläche der Sonne darstellt. Filamente sind Plasmagebilde, welche in der Photosphäre verankert sind und von der Chromosphäre in die Korona reichen, der äußersten Atmosphärenschicht der Sonne. Diese Strukturen werden durch das Magnetfeld der Sonne stabilisiert. Durch Störungen des Magnetfelds, destabilisiert sich das Filament und das dort enthaltene Plasma kann als Sonneneruption, ein sogenannter koronaler Massenauswurf, ins Weltall geschleudert werden, welcher auch die Erde treffen könnte. Das Verständnis von Filamenten, deren Stabilität und Verbindung zum Magnetfeld sind ungemein wichtig, um Sonneneruptionen besser verstehen und vorhersagen zu können. Ein spezieller Typ von Filamenten, sind polare Filamente, (engl. polar crown filaments). Diese bilden sich an der Grenzfläche des unipolaren Magnetfelds an den Polen und dem Magnetfeld von gemischten Polaritäten in den Aktivitätsgürteln der Sonne. In letzteren werden Reste von bipolaren und zerfallenen Sonnenfleckengruppen zum Pol transportiert. Dieser Transport wird durch den Sonnendynamo initialisiert, so dass die Untersuchung polarer Filamente indirekt Rückschlüsse auf den Sonnendynamo zulässt. Die vorliegende Arbeit untersucht die polaren Filamente aus zwei Perspektiven. Zum einen aus der globalen Perspektive, bei der wir synoptische Beobachtungen der gesamten Sonnenscheibe nutzen, um das zyklische Verhalten der Filamente zu untersuchen. Zum anderen aus einer detailorientierten Perspektive, wobei wir hochaufgelöste Beobachtungen der Filamente auswerten, um mehr über die Verbindung von kühlem chromosphärischem Plasma zum Magnetfeld zu erfahren. Für die Untersuchung des zyklischen Verhaltens von polaren Filamenten nutzen wir Daten des Chromospheric Telescope (ChroTel), welches alle drei Minuten Aufnahmen der Chromosphäre in drei verschiedenen Wellenlängen macht. Die Wasserstofflinie der Balmerserie Hα ist dabei die beste Möglichkeit Filamente in der Chromosphäre abzubilden. Eine während dieser Arbeit entwickelte Methode, zum Korrigieren von Intensitätsungleichmäßigkeiten in Sonnenbildern, legt den Grundstein für alle weiteren Studien mit diesen Daten. Die Filamente können somit aus den Bildern heraus extrahiert werden und damit kann der aktuelle Sonnenzyklus zwischen Maximum und Minimum untersucht werden. Wir konnten die Wanderung der polaren Filamente für den Sonnenzyklus 24 in den Daten lokalisieren und die polwärtsgerichtete Geschwindigkeit bestimmen, welche wir mit vorherigen Ergebnissen verglichen haben. Da die morphologischen Bildbearbeitungsmethode, welche wir zur Extraktion der Filamente benutzt haben, auch andere Strukturen, wie Sonnenflecken nicht ausschließen konnte, haben wir neue Methoden entwickelt, die auf Maschinellem Lernen mit tiefen neuronalen Netzwerken beruhen. Die vorläufigen Ergebnisse sind sehr vielversprechend und auch auf Hα Bildern von anderen Teleskopen leicht übertragbar. Für die Untersuchung der polaren Filamente mit hochaufgelösten Bildern verwenden wir Beobachtungen vom Vakuumturmteleskop (VTT) auf Teneriffa, Spanien. Die Bilder wurden mit Hα Schmal- und Breitbandfiltern aufgenommen und zeigen sowohl die Chromosphäre als auch die Photosphäre. Wir untersuchen dabei die kleinsten auflösbaren Aufhellungen, (engl. bright points), welche in Verbindung mit dem Magnetfeld stehen. Diese kleinskaligen Aufhellungen finden wir vor allem an den Fußpunktregionen der Filamente, die mit starken Konzentrationen vom Magnetfeld korrelieren. Solche hellen Punkte in der Nähe von polaren Filamenten wurden bisher nie mit hochaufgelösten Beobachtungen untersucht. Die statistische Auswertung dieser Strukturen zeigt, dass sie sich kaum von ihren äquatornahen Gegenstücken unterscheiden, mit Ausnahme einer tendenziell größeren Fläche.…