H2 emission in the solar atmosphere

Abstract

New identifications of emission lines of molecular hydrogen in the EUV spectrum of sunspots are reported. The spectra were obtained during the first and second flights of the Naval Research Laboratory's High Resolution Telescope and Spectrograph (HRTS). While most of the lines originate in the Lyman bands, fluorescence from the Werner bands has been found for the first time in the solar atmosphere. H2 fluorescent emission has also been identified in the spectra of a solar flare observed with NRL's normal incidence spectrograph on Skylab. Column densities for H2 are derived from intensities of lines in the sunspot spectra.