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Rapid acceleration of energetic particles in the 1982 February 8 solar flare

Technical Report ·
OSTI ID:6594760
Hard x-ray and gamma-ray measurements of the 1982 February 8 (about 1250 UT) solar flare made with spectrometers aboard the ISEE 3 and SMM spacecraft show that bursts of photons from about 40 keV to about 40 MeV are coincident to within + or - 1 s. This indicates that the acceleration of particles to relativistic velocities can occur promptly (within about 1 s). As far as the energetic particles interacting at the Sun are concerned, the two-phase process, which requires several minutes for particle acceleration to relativistic velocities, cannot account for the present gamma-ray observations. Even the two-step acceleration process, which is assumed to occur in a small magnetic loop, is severely constrained by the present observations.
Research Organization:
New Hampshire Univ., Durham (USA). Dept. of Physics
OSTI ID:
6594760
Report Number(s):
AD-A-199486/2/XAB
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English