A robust, calibrated method for measuring sunspot areas from SOHO/MDI and SDO/HMI full-disk images enables a consistent, observer-independent, long-term catalogue of daily sunspot areas, revealing detailed patterns of sunspot group area evolution and solar cycle variability.
High-latitude m=1 inertial modes were analyzed and characterized using the time-distance helioseismic subsurface flows. It was found that the mode’s power exhibits an anti-correlation with solar activity. Magnetic flux transported from low to high latitudes influences both the mode’s power and lifetime, enhancing its power and shortening its lifetime upon arrival.
Magnetic power spectra were calculated using MDI and HMI data for two solar cycles. It is found that the sizes of the magnetic networks do not show a cycle dependence, but the power-law indices estimated from the active region and network sizes show an anti-correlation with the sunspot numbers.
Twelve years of HMI Dopplergram and magnetogram data have been used to uncover the solar cycle dependence of the magnetically quietest regions on the Sun and to reveal an enigmatic behavior of the surface-gravity wave energy contained in those regions.
A new model, which explores the polar field build-up rate and the amplitude of the following cycle, predicts a slightly stronger Cycle 25 than previously thought.
The Sun’s toroidal field is derived using 45 years of Wilcox Solar Observatory data, 16 years of Michelson Doppler Imager data, and 11 years of Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager data. The duration of each cycle in both hemispheres is also estimated.
Magnetic-field dependence of active regions’ tilt angles are analyzed using the MDI and HMI observations for two solar cycles. The variation of the tilt angles with the maximum magnetic-field strength of the ARs indicates a nonlinear tilt quenching in the Babcock–Leighton process.
The Sun’s poloidal and toroidal magnetic field components derived from synoptic magnetograms are assimilated into a mean-field dynamo model, and activity level for Cycle 25 is predicted based on this approach.
Subsurface meridional flows from ring-diagram analysis showed a clear hemispheric asymmetry in last 18 years. Interestingly, this flow asymmetry leads the magnetic flux and sunspot number asymmetry by 3.1 – 3.6 years.
Features of the Shannon entropy transfer between solar magnetic modes are described and analyzed. It is confirmed that solar magnetic modes can be separated into three groups: entropy sources, entropy transmitters, and entropy targets.