STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES

Jie, Zhang; Yuming, Wang

doi:10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006

Title: STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES

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Abstract

We have developed a computational software system to automate the process of identifying solar active regions (ARs) and quantifying their physical properties based on high-resolution synoptic magnetograms constructed from Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI; on board the SOHO spacecraft) images from 1996 to 2008. The system, based on morphological analysis and intensity thresholding, has four functional modules: (1) intensity segmentation to obtain kernel pixels, (2) a morphological opening operation to erase small kernels, which effectively remove ephemeral regions and magnetic fragments in decayed ARs, (3) region growing to extend kernels to full AR size, and (4) the morphological closing operation to merge/group regions with a small spatial gap. We calculate the basic physical parameters of the 1730 ARs identified by the auto system. The mean and maximum magnetic flux of individual ARs are 1.67 x 10{sup 22} Mx and 1.97 x 10{sup 23} Mx, while that per Carrington rotation are 1.83 x 10{sup 23} Mx and 6.96 x 10{sup 23} Mx, respectively. The frequency distributions of ARs with respect to both area size and magnetic flux follow a log-normal function. However, when we decrease the detection thresholds and thus increase the number of detected ARs, the frequency distribution largely follows amore »« less

Authors:

Jie, Zhang ^[1]; Yuming, Wang ^[2]

Department of Computational and Data Sciences, George Mason University, 4400 University Dr., MSN 6A2, Fairfax, VA 22030 (United States)
School of Earth and Space Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, 96 Jinzhai Road, Heifei, Anhui 230026 (China)

Publication Date:: Wed Nov 10 00:00:00 EST 2010

OSTI Identifier:: 21471284

Resource Type:: Journal Article

Journal Name:: Astrophysical Journal

Additional Journal Information:: Journal Volume: 723; Journal Issue: 2; Other Information: DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006; Journal ID: ISSN 0004-637X

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

Subject:: 79 ASTROPHYSICS, COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY; COMPUTER CODES; MAGNETIC FLUX; MAGNETISM; PHYSICAL PROPERTIES; SOLAR CYCLE; SUN; TOPOLOGY; MAIN SEQUENCE STARS; MATHEMATICS; STARS

Citation Formats


                    Jie, Zhang, Yuming, Wang, and Liu Yang, E-mail: jzhang7@gmu.ed. STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES.  United States: N. p., 2010. 
        Web.  doi:10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006.

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                    Jie, Zhang, Yuming, Wang, & Liu Yang, E-mail: jzhang7@gmu.ed. STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES.  United States.  https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006

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                    Jie, Zhang, Yuming, Wang, and Liu Yang, E-mail: jzhang7@gmu.ed. 2010.  
        "STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES".  United States.  https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006.

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@article{osti_21471284,

  title        = {STATISTICAL PROPERTIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS OBTAINED FROM AN AUTOMATIC DETECTION SYSTEM AND THE COMPUTATIONAL BIASES},

  author       = {Jie, Zhang and Yuming, Wang and Liu Yang, E-mail: jzhang7@gmu.ed},

  abstractNote = {We have developed a computational software system to automate the process of identifying solar active regions (ARs) and quantifying their physical properties based on high-resolution synoptic magnetograms constructed from Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI; on board the SOHO spacecraft) images from 1996 to 2008. The system, based on morphological analysis and intensity thresholding, has four functional modules: (1) intensity segmentation to obtain kernel pixels, (2) a morphological opening operation to erase small kernels, which effectively remove ephemeral regions and magnetic fragments in decayed ARs, (3) region growing to extend kernels to full AR size, and (4) the morphological closing operation to merge/group regions with a small spatial gap. We calculate the basic physical parameters of the 1730 ARs identified by the auto system. The mean and maximum magnetic flux of individual ARs are 1.67 x 10{sup 22} Mx and 1.97 x 10{sup 23} Mx, while that per Carrington rotation are 1.83 x 10{sup 23} Mx and 6.96 x 10{sup 23} Mx, respectively. The frequency distributions of ARs with respect to both area size and magnetic flux follow a log-normal function. However, when we decrease the detection thresholds and thus increase the number of detected ARs, the frequency distribution largely follows a power-law function. We also find that the equatorward drifting motion of the AR bands with solar cycle can be described by a linear function superposed with intermittent reverse driftings. The average drifting speed over one solar cycle is 1{sup o}.83{+-}0{sup o}.04 yr{sup -1} or 0.708 {+-} 0.015 m s{sup -1}.},

  doi          = {10.1088/0004-637X/723/2/1006},

  url          = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/21471284},
  journal      = {Astrophysical Journal},

  issn         = {0004-637X},

  number       = 2,

  volume       = 723,

  place        = {United States},

  year         = {Wed Nov 10 00:00:00 EST 2010},

  month        = {Wed Nov 10 00:00:00 EST 2010}

}

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