Energy input for explosive events in the transition zone

It is suggested that the energy input for explosive events in the transition zone comes from precipitating ions, typically of energies of a few×10² keV/nucleon, accelerated in the high corona. The energetics of the process are discussed, together with implications for coronal heating.     

Radio emission from quasi-parallel shock waves in the corona

Shock waves in the solar corona manifest themselves in type II bursts in dynamic radio spectra. Recently, short large amplitude magnetic structures (SLAMS) have been observed in the vicinity of the quasi-parallel region of Earth's bow shock as an example of a collisionless shock wave in space plasmas. SLAMS are able to accelerate electrons to high energies by shock drift acceleration. Assuming that SLAMS also appear in the vicinity of super-critical, quasi-parallel shocks in the corona, electrons can also be accelerated at quasi-parallel shocks and, subsequently, generate radio waves manifesting in solar type II radio bursts.     

MHD waves in coronal flux tubes

The basic MHD waves of a coronal flux loop are investigated for the rectangular box model of a plasma with oblique magnetic field and line-tied at the ends. The waves found are completely different from those in a periodic box, representative for tokamaks. They consist of a mixture of Alfvén components with a ballooning factor, favouring minimal field line bending, and fast components without such a factor. Pure Alfvén modes are only found as singular limiting cases of cluster spectra of Alfvén-fast waves, where the fast components are localised in a photospheric boundary layer which is dictated by the requirements of line-tying. This justifies the assumption of continuous spectra in coronal loops, required for the mechanism of resonant Alfvén wave heating. The waves consist of large amplitude Alfvén components in the corona and fast components with a small but rapidly varying amplitude in the boundary layer, so that they appear to have the right signature for effective transfer of energy from the photosphere to the corona.     

Imaging diagnostics of solar non-thermal particles

Non-thermal hard X-ray, gamma-ray and radio emission are the most direct signatures of the presence of energetic particles in the solar atmosphere. This paper lays emphasis on hard X-ray and radio imaging data, obtained during and outside flares, which reveal the sites where particles interact with the ambient medium. These observations, which provide more or less direct information on the topology and dynamics of the magnetic structures in which particles are accelerated and propagate, are discussed in the framework of the statistical flare scenario.     

Phase Control in Multibeam Arrays

The phases of the radiation fields in a multibeam antenna are analyzed and their relations to the feed network are established. A method of phase control is proposed and applied to the case of cophasal beams radiated from an array for which the feed network is a lossless Butler matrix.     

Quantization and Saturation Noise Due to Analog-to-Digital Conversion of Radar Returns from Targets with Log-Normal Radar Cross-Section Distributions

An analysis of the saturation and quantization noise generated by analog-to-digital (A/D) conversion of radar returns from targets with log-normal radar cross sections is presented. The results of the analysis show that the high-cross-section tails of the log-normal distribution require higher saturation levels to be set in the A/D converter. The setting of the higher saturation level in the converter results in an increase in quantization noise. Thus the minimum achievable distortion in the output of the A/D converter signal is considerably higher than that for radar targets if their radar cross section had an exponential power distribution.     

Radar Track Acquisition Range

The track acquisiton range of a track-while-scan radar is defined as the range at which the cumulative probability of M detections in N scans is 90 percent. Track acquisition ranges for 2 out of 3, 2 out of 4, and 3 out of 4 detection criteria are presented for Swerling 0, 1, and 3 target models.     

Simple Expressions for Determining Radar Detection Thresholds

The threshold value required to obtain a specified false-alarm probability, when postdetection integration follows a square-law or an envelope detector, is frequently needed in theoretical and practical studies of radar signal processor performance. The determination of such threshold values requires a substantial numerical computational effort. In this correspondence, simple expressions are presented with which these thresholds can be determined with excellent accuracy using only a scientific calculator.