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Stellar flares are characterized by sudden enhancement of electromagnetic radiation from the atmospheres of stars. Compared to their solar counterparts, our knowledge on the coronal plasma dynamics of stellar flares and their connection to coronal mass ejections (CMEs) remains very limited. With time-resolved high-resolution spectroscopic observations from the \textit{Chandra} X-ray observatory, we detected noticeable coronal plasma flows during several stellar flares on a nearby dMe star EV Lac. In the observed spectra of O~{\sc{viii}} (3 MK), Fe~{\sc{xvii}} (6 MK), Mg~{\sc{xii}} (10 MK), and Si~{\sc{xiv}} (16 MK) lines, these flare-induced upflows/downflows appear as significant Doppler shifts of several tens to \speed{130}, and the upflow velocity generally increases with temperature. Variable line ratios of the Si~{\sc{xiii}} triplet reveal that these plasma flows in most flares are accompanied by an increase of the coronal plasma density and temperature. We interpret these results as X-ray evidences for chromospheric evaporation on EV Lac. In two successive flares, the plasma flow pattern and a sharp increase of the measured coronal density are highly suggestive of explosive evaporation. The transition from redshifts to blueshifts in such an explosive evaporation occurs at a temperature of at least 10 MK, much higher than that observed in solar flares ($\sim$1 MK). However, in one flare the cool and warm upflows appear to be accompanied by a decreasing plasma density, which might be explained by a stellar filament/prominence eruption coupled to this flare. These results provide important clues to understand the coronal plasma dynamics during flares on M dwarfs., accepted by ApJ

Context. Plasma loops or plumes rooted in sunspot umbrae often harbor downflows with speeds of 100 km s−1. These downflows are supersonic at transition region temperatures of ∼0.1 MK. The source of these flows is not well understood. Aims. We aim to investigate the source of sunspot supersonic downflows (SSDs) in active region 12740 using simultaneous spectroscopic and imaging observations. Methods. We identified SSD events from multiple raster scans of a sunspot by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, and we calculated the electron densities, mass fluxes, and velocities of these SSDs. The extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) images provided by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory and the EUV Imager onboard the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory were employed to investigate the origin of these SSDs and their associated coronal rain. Results. Almost all the identified SSDs appear at the footpoints of sunspot plumes and are temporally associated with the appearance of chromospheric bright dots inside the sunspot umbra. Dual-perspective EUV imaging observations reveal a large-scale closed magnetic loop system spanning the sunspot region and a remote region. We observed that the SSDs are caused by repeated coronal rain that forms and flows along these closed magnetic loops toward the sunspot. One episode of coronal rain clearly indicates that reconnection near a coronal X-shaped structure first leads to the formation of a magnetic dip. Subsequently, hot coronal plasma catastrophically cools from ∼2 MK in the dip region via thermal instability. This results in the formation of a transient prominence in the dip, from which the cool gas mostly slides into the sunspot along inclined magnetic fields under the gravity. This drainage process manifests as a continuous rain flow, which lasts for ∼2 h and concurrently results in a nearly steady SSD event. The total mass of condensation (1.3 × 1014 g) and condensation rate (1.5 × 1010 g s−1) in the dip region were found to be sufficient to sustain this long-lived SSD event, which has a mass transport rate of 0.7 − 1.2 × 1010 g s−1. Conclusions. Our results demonstrate that coronal condensation in magnetic dips can result in the quasi-steady sunspot supersonic downflows.

Dynamic features, such as chromospheric jets, transition region network jets, coronal plumes and coronal jets, are abundant in the network regions of the solar polar coronal holes. We investigate the relationship between chromospheric jets and coronal activities (e.g., coronal plumes and jets).We analyze observations of a polar coronal hole including the filtergrams that were taken by the New Vacuum Solar Telescope (NVST) at the H{\alpha}-0.6 {\AA}to study the H{\alpha} jets,and the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) 171 {\AA} images to follow the evolution of coronal activities. H{\alpha} jets are persistent in the network regions, only some regions (denoted as R1-R5) are rooted with discernible coronal plumes.With an automated method, we identify and track 1 320 H{\alpha} jets in the network regions. We find that the average lifetime, height and ascending speed of the H{\alpha} jets are 75.38 s, 2.67 Mm, 65.60 km s$^{-1}$, respectively. The H{\alpha} jets rooted in R1-R5 are higher and faster than those in the others. We also find that propagating disturbances (PDs) in coronal plumes have a close connection with the H{\alpha} jets. The speeds of 28 out of 29 H{\alpha} jets associated with PDs are about 50 km s$^{-1}$ . In a case of coronal jet, we find that the speeds of both the coronal jet and the H{\alpha} jet are over 150 km s$^{-1}$, suggesting that both cool and hot jets can be coupled together. Based on our analyses, it is evident that more dynamic H{\alpha} jets could release the energies to the corona, which might be the results of the development of Kelvin-Helmholtz instability (KHi) or small-scaled magnetic activities. We suggest that chromospheric jets, transition region network jets and ray-like features in the corona are coherent phenomena, and they are important tunnels for cycling energy and mass in the solar atmosphere., Comment: 13 pages,6 figures,accepted for publication in A&A

The extreme ultraviolet (EUV) observations are widely used in solar activity research and space weather forecasting since they can observe both the solar eruptions and the source regions of the solar wind. Flat field processing is indispensable to remove the instrumental non-uniformity of a solar EUV imager in producing high-quality scientific data from original observed data. Fengyun-3E (FY-3E) is a meteorological satellite operated in Sun-synchronous orbit, and the routine EUV imaging data from the Solar X-ray and Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (X-EUVI) onboard FY-3E has the characteristics of concentric rotation. Taking advantage of the concentric rotation, we propose a post-hoc flat field measurement method for its EUV 195 channel in this paper. This method removes small-scale and time-varying component of the coronal activities by taking the median value for each pixel along the time axis of a concentric rotation data cube, and then derives large-scale and invariable component of the quiet coronal radiation, and finally generates a flat field image. Analysis shows that our method is able to measure the instrumental spot-like non-uniformity possibly caused by contamination on the detector, which mostly disappears after the in-orbit self-cleaning process. It can also measure the quasi-periodic grid-like non-uniformity, possibly from the obscuration of the support mesh on the rear filter. After flat field correction, these instrumental non-uniformities from the original data are effectively removed. X-EUVI 195 data after dark and flat field corrections are consistent with the 193 channel data from SDO/AIA, verifying the suitability of the method. Our method is not only suitable for FY-3E/X-EUVI but also a candidate method for the flat field measurement of future solar EUV telescopes., 14 pages, 6 figures, Accepted for publication in RAA (Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics)

We report the smallest coronal jets ever observed in the quiet Sun with recent high resolution observations from the High Resolution Telescopes (HRI-EUV and HRI-Ly{\alpha}) of the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) onboard Solar Orbiter. In the HRI-EUV (174 {\AA}) images, these microjets usually appear as nearly collimated structures with brightenings at their footpoints. Their average lifetime, projected speed, width, and maximum length are 4.6 min, 62 km s^(-1), 1.0 Mm, and 7.7 Mm, respectively. Inverted-Y shaped structures and moving blobs can be identified in some events. A subset of these events also reveal signatures in the HRI-Ly{\alpha} (H I Ly{\alpha} at 1216 {\AA}) images and the extreme ultraviolet images taken by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory. Our differential emission measure analysis suggests a multi-thermal nature and an average density of ~1.4x10^9 cm^(-3) for these microjets. Their thermal and kinetic energies were estimated to be ~3.9x10^24 erg and ~2.9x10^23 erg, respectively, which are of the same order of the released energy predicted by the nanoflare theory. Most events appear to be located at the edges of network lanes and magnetic flux concentrations, suggesting that these coronal microjets are likely generated by magnetic reconnection between small-scale magnetic loops and the adjacent network field., Comment: Accepted by ApJL, 19 pages, 6 figures, and 2 tables

Coronal loops are building blocks of solar active regions (ARs). However, their formation is not well understood. Here we present direct observational evidence for the formation of coronal loops through magnetic reconnection as new magnetic fluxes emerge to the solar atmosphere. Observations in the EUV passbands of SDO/AIA clearly show the newly formed loops following magnetic reconnection within a vertical current sheet. Formation of the loops is also seen in the Hα images taken by NVST. The SDO/HMI observations show that a positive-polarity flux concentration moves toward a negative-polarity one with a speed of ~0.5 km s-1 before the apparent formation of coronal loops. During the formation of coronal loops, we found signatures of flux cancellation and subsequent enhancement of the transverse field between the two polarities. We have reconstructed the three-dimensional magnetic field structure through a magnetohydrostatic model, which shows field lines consistent with the loops in AIA images. Numerous bright blobs with a width of ~1.5 Mm appear intermittently in the current sheet and move upward with apparent velocities of ~80 km s-1. We have also identified plasma blobs moving to the footpoints of the newly formed large loops, with apparent velocities ranging from 30 to 50 km s-1. A differential emission measure analysis shows that the temperature, emission measure and density of the bright blobs are 2.5-3.5 MK, 1.1-2.3×1028 cm-5 and 8.9-12.9×109 cm-3, respectively. Power spectral analysis of these blobs indicates that the magnetic reconnection is inconsistent with the turbulent reconnection scenario.

Coronal upflows at the edges of active regions (AR), which are a possible source of slow solar wind, have been found to connect with dynamics in the transition region. To infer at what scale transition region dynamics connect to AR upflows, we investigate the statistical properties of the small-scale dynamics in the transition region underneath the upflows at the edge of AR NOAA 11934. With observations from the Interface Region Imaging Spectragraph (IRIS), we found that the Si IV 1403\,\AA\ Doppler map consists of numerous blue-shifted and red-shifted patches mostly with sizes less than 1\,$Mm^2$. The blue-shifted structures in the transition region tend to be brighter than the red-shifted ones, but their nonthermal velocities have no significant difference. With the SWAMIS feature tracking procedure, in IRIS slit-jaw 1400\,\AA\ images we found that dynamic bright dots with an average size of about 0.3\,$Mm^2$ and lifetimes mostly less than 200\,s spread all over the region. Most of the bright dots appear to be localised, without clear signature of propagation of plasma to a long distance on the projection plane. Surge-like motions with speeds about 15 km/s could be seen in some events at the boundaries of the upflow region, where the magnetic field appear to be inclined. We conclude that the transition region dynamics connecting to coronal upflows should occur in very fine scale, suggesting that the corresponding coronal upflows should also be highly-structured. It is also plausible that the transition region dynamics might just act as stimulation at the coronal base that then drives the upflows in the corona., Comment: 16 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

We investigate the chromospheric counterpart of small-scale coronal loops constituting a coronal bright point (CBP) and its response to a photospheric magnetic-flux increase accompanied by co-temporal CBP heating. We used co-observations from the AIA and HMI/SDO, together with data from the Fast Imaging Solar Spectrograph taken in the Halpha and Ca II 8542 lines. We used a new multi-layer spectral inversion technique to derive the temporal variations of the temperature of the Halpha loops (HLs). We find that the counterpart of the CBP, as seen at chromospheric temperatures, is composed of a bundle of dark elongated features named in this work Halpha loops, which constitute an integral part of the CBP loop magnetic structure. An increase in the photospheric magnetic flux due to flux emergence is accompanied by a rise of the coronal emission of the CBP loops, that is a heating episode. We also observe enhanced chromospheric activity associated with the occurrence of new HLs and mottles. While the coronal emission and magnetic flux increases appear to be co-temporal, the response of the Halpha counterpart of the CBP occurs with a small delay of less than 3 min. A sharp temperature increase is found in one of the HLs and in one of the CBP footpoints estimated at 46% and 55% with respect to the pre-event values, also starting with a delay of less than 3~min following the coronal heating episode. The low-lying CBP loop structure remains non-potential for the entire observing period. The magnetic topological analysis of the overlying corona reveals the presence of a coronal null point at the beginning and towards the end of the heating episode. The delay in the response of the chromospheric counterpart of the CBP suggests that the heating may have occurred at coronal heights., 14 pages, 14 figures, accepted for publication in A&A

We present a case study for the global extreme-ultraviolet (EUV) wave and its chromospheric counterpart the Moreton-Ramsey Wave associated with the second X-class flare in Solar Cycle 25 and a halo coronal mass ejection (CME). The EUV wave was observed in the Hα and EUV passbands with different characteristic temperatures. In the 171 Å and 193/195 Å images, the wave propagates circularly with an initial velocity of 600–720 km s−1 and a deceleration of 110–320 m s−2. The local coronal plasma is heated from log(T/K) ≈ 5.9 to log(T/K) ≈ 6.2 during the passage of the wave front. The Hα and 304 Å images also reveal signatures of wave propagation with a velocity of 310–540 km s−1. With multiwavelength and dual-perspective observations, we found that the wave front likely propagates forwardly inclined to the solar surface with a tilt angle of ∼53°.2. Our results suggest that this EUV wave is a fast-mode magnetohydrodynamic wave or shock driven by the expansion of the associated CME, whose wave front is likely a dome-shaped structure that could impact the upper chromosphere, transition region, and corona.

As one of the most common features in the solar atmosphere, filaments are significant not only in the solar physics but also in the stellar and laboratory plasma physics. With the New Vacuum Solar Telescope and the Solar Dynamics Observatory, here we report on multi-wavelength observations of eruptions of a small (30\arcsec) filament (SF) and its consequences while interacting with the ambient magnetic features including a large (300\arcsec) filament (LF). The eruptions of the SF drive a two-side-loop jet that is a result of magnetic reconnection between the SF threads and an over-lying magnetic channel. As a consequence of the eruption, the heating in the footpoints of the SF destabilises the barbs of the LF rooted nearby. Supersonic chromospheric plasma flows along the barbs of the LF are then observed in the \halpha\ passband and they apparently feed materials to the LF. We suggest they are shock-driven plasma flows or chromospheric evaporations, which both can be the consequences of the heating in the chromosphere by nonthermal particles generated in the magnetic reconnection associated with the two-side-loop jet. Our observations demonstrate that the destabilisation in the vicinity of the footpoints of a barb can drive chromospheric plasma feeding to the filament., 4 figures, 6 pages, accepted for publication in MNRAS:Letter

Coronal loops are building blocks of solar active regions. However, their formation mechanism is still not well understood. Here we present direct observational evidence for the formation of coronal loops through magnetic reconnection as new magnetic fluxes emerge into the solar atmosphere. Extreme-ultraviolet observations of the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) onboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) clearly show the newly formed loops following magnetic reconnection within a plasma sheet. Formation of the loops is also seen in the h{\alpha} line-core images taken by the New Vacuum Solar Telescope. Observations from the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager onboard SDO show that a positive-polarity flux concentration moves towards a negative-polarity one with a speed of ~0.4 km/s, before the formation of coronal loops. During the loop formation process, we found signatures of flux cancellation and subsequent enhancement of the transverse field between the two polarities. The three-dimensional magnetic field structure reconstructed through a magnetohydrostatic model shows field lines consistent with the loops in AIA images. Numerous bright blobs with an average width of 1.37 Mm appear intermittently in the plasma sheet and move upward with a projected velocity of ~114 km/s. The temperature, emission measure and density of these blobs are about 3 MK, 2.0x10^(28) cm^(-5) and 1.2x10^(10) cm^(-3), respectively. A power spectral analysis of these blobs indicates that the observed reconnection is likely not dominated by a turbulent process. We have also identified flows with a velocity of 20 to 50 km/s towards the footpoints of the newly formed coronal loops., Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

Loops are one of the fundamental structures that trace the geometry of the magnetic field in the solar atmosphere. Their evolution and dynamics provide a crucial proxy for studying how the magnetized structures are formed and heated in the solar atmosphere. Here, we report on spectroscopic observations of a set of transition region loops taken by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) at Si IV 1394 \AA\ with a sit-and-stare mode. The loops are corresponding to the flux emergence at its very late phase when the emerged magentic features in the photosphere have fully developed. We find the transition region loops are still expanding and moving upward with a velocity of a few kilometers per second ($\lesssim$10 km/s) at this stage. The expansion of the loops leads to interactions between themselves and the ambient field, which can drive magnetic reconnection evidenced by multiple intense brightenings, including transition region explosive events and IRIS bombs in the footpoint region associated with the moving polarity. A set of quasi-periodic brightenings with a period of about 130 s is found at the loop apex, from which the Si IV 1394 \AA\ profiles are significantly non-Gaussian with enhancements at both blue and red wings at Doppler velocities of about 50 km/s. We suggest that the transition region loops in the very late phase of flux emergence can be powered by heating events generated by the interactions between the expanding loops and the ambient fields and also by (quasi-)periodic processes, such as oscillation-modulated braiding reconnection., Comment: 10 pages, 5 figs, accepted for publication in ApJ

Both coronal plumes and network jets are rooted in network lanes. The relationship between the two, however, has yet to be addressed. For this purpose, we perform an observational analysis using images acquired with the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) 171�� passband to follow the evolution of coronal plumes, the observations taken by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) slit-jaw 1330�� to study the network jets, and the line-of-sight magnetograms taken by the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (HMI) to overview the the photospheric magnetic features in the regions. Four regions in the network lanes are identified, and labeled ``R1--R4''. We find that coronal plumes are clearly seen only in ``R1''&''R2'' but not in ``R3''&``R4'', even though network jets abound in all these regions. Furthermore, while magnetic features in all these regions are dominated by positive polarity, they are more compact (suggesting stronger convergence) in ``R1''&``R2'' than that in ``R3''&``R4''. We develop an automated method to identify and track the network jets in the regions. We find that the network jets rooted in ``R1''&``R2'' are higher and faster than that in ``R3''&``R4'',indicating that network regions producing stronger coronal plumes also tend to produce more dynamic network jets. We suggest that the stronger convergence in ``R1''&``R2'' might provide a condition for faster shocks and/or more small-scale magnetic reconnection events that power more dynamic network jets and coronal plumes., The preprint of an article accepted for publication in Solar Physics

The Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) reveals numerous small-scale (sub-arcsecond) brightenings that appear as bright dots sparkling the solar transition region in active regions. Here, we report a statistical study on these transition region bright dots. We use an automatic approach to identify 2742 dots in a Si IV raster image. We find that the average spatial size of the dots is 0.8 arcsec$^2$ and most of them are located in the faculae area. Their Doppler velocities obtained from the Si IV 1394 {\AA} line range from -20 to 20 km/s. Among these 2742 dots, 1224 are predominantly blue-shifted and 1518 are red-shifted. Their nonthermal velocities range from 4 to 50 km/s with an average of 24 km/s. We speculate that the bright dots studied here are small-scale impulsive energetic events that can heat the active region corona., Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, publication in AIP Conference Proceedings

We present observations of persistent oscillations of some bright features in the upper-chromosphere/transition-region above sunspots taken by IRIS SJ 1400 {\AA} and upward propagating quasi-periodic disturbances along coronal loops rooted in the same region taken by AIA 171 {\AA} passband. The oscillations of the features are cyclic oscillatory motions without any obvious damping. The amplitudes of the spatial displacements of the oscillations are about 1 $^{"}$. The apparent velocities of the oscillations are comparable to the sound speed in the chromosphere, but the upward motions are slightly larger than that of the downward. The intensity variations can take 24-53% of the background, suggesting nonlinearity of the oscillations. The FFT power spectra of the oscillations show dominant peak at a period of about 3 minutes, in consistent with the omnipresent 3 minute oscillations in sunspots. The amplitudes of the intensity variations of the upward propagating coronal disturbances are 10-15% of the background. The coronal disturbances have a period of about 3 minutes, and propagate upward along the coronal loops with apparent velocities in a range of 30-80 km/s. We propose a scenario that the observed transition region oscillations are powered continuously by upward propagating shocks, and the upward propagating coronal disturbances can be the recurrent plasma flows driven by shocks or responses of degenerated shocks that become slow magnetic-acoustic waves after heating the plasma in the coronal loops at their transition-region bases., Comment: 13 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ

Various small-scale structures abound in the solar atmosphere above active regions, playing an important role in the dynamics and evolution therein. We report on a new class of small-scale transition region structures in active regions, characterized by strong emissions but extremely narrow Si IV line profiles as found in observations taken with the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS). Tentatively named as Narrow-line-width UV bursts (NUBs), these structures are located above sunspots and comprise of one or multiple compact bright cores at sub-arcsecond scales. We found six NUBs in two datasets (a raster and a sit-and-stare dataset). Among these, four events are short-living with a duration of $\sim$10 mins while two last for more than 36 mins. All NUBs have Doppler shifts of 15--18 km/s, while the NUB found in sit-and-stare data possesses an additional component at $\sim$50 km/s found only in the C II and Mg II lines. Given that these events are found to play a role in the local dynamics, it is important to further investigate the physical mechanisms that generate these phenomena and their role in the mass transport in sunspots., 8 pages, 4 figures and 1 table, accepted for publication in ApJL

Coronal bright points (BPs) are associated with magnetic bipolar features (MBFs) and magnetic cancellation. Here, we investigate how BP-associated MBFs form and how the consequent magnetic cancellation occurs. We analyse longitudinal magnetograms from the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager to investigate the photospheric magnetic flux evolution of 70 BPs. From images taken in the 193 A passband of the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) we dermine that the BPs' lifetimes vary from 2.7 to 58.8 hours. The formation of the BP MBFs is found to involve three processes, namely emergence, convergence and local coalescence of the magnetic fluxes. The formation of a MBF can involve more than one of these processes. Out of the 70 cases, flux emergence is the main process of a MBF buildup of 52 BPs, mainly convergence is seen in 28, and 14 cases are associated with local coalescence. For MBFs formed by bipolar emergence, the time difference between the flux emergence and the BP appearance in the AIA 193 \AA\ passband varies from 0.1 to 3.2 hours with an average of 1.3 hours. While magnetic cancellation is found in all 70 BPs, it can occur in three different ways: (I) between a MBF and small weak magnetic features (in 33 BPs); (II) within a MBF with the two polarities moving towards each other from a large distance (34 BPs); (III) within a MBF whose two main polarities emerge in the same place simultaneously (3 BPs). While a MBF builds up the skeleton of a BP, we find that the magnetic activities responsible for the BP heating may involve small weak fields., Comment: 20 pages, 16 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ