Quasibiennial Oscillations of the North–South Asymmetry

Abstract

The north-south (N-S) asymmetry of the solar activity (A), which reflects differences in the behavior of the northern and southern hemispheres of the Sun, is studied using data on the brightness of the coronal green line, the total number and area of sunspots, and the net magnetic flux. The spatial and temporal distributions and correlations between the A values represented by these indices are considered. The characteristic time variations in A are similar for all the indices, on both long and short time scales. Quasibiennial oscillations (QBOs) can be traced in the asymmetries of all four indices. A detailed study of the QBOs is carried out based on spectral-variation and wavelet analyses. Long-term increases and decreases occur synchronously in the asymmetries of various indices and are much more pronounced in A than in the indices themselves. A negative correlation between the power of the QBOs and the asymmetry of A can be traced; it is most clearly manifest as a substantial diminishing of the QBOs during the mid-1960s, which coincided with an especially strong increase in A. Our analysis shows that the N-S asymmetry is probably a fundamental property that controls the coupling and degree of coincidence between the magnetic-field-generation mechanisms operating in the northern and southern hemispheres.