Sunspot waves and flare energy release

Abstract

We address a possibility of the flare process initiation and further maintenance of its energy release due to a transformation of sunspot longitudinal waves into transverse magnetic loop oscillations with initiation of reconnection. This leads to heating maintaining after the energy release peak and formation of a flat stage on the X-ray profile. We applied the time-distance plots and pixel wavelet filtration (PWF) methods to obtain spatio-temporal distribution of wave power variations in SDO/AIA data. To find magnetic waveguides, we used magnetic field extrapolation of SDO/HMI magnetograms. The propagation velocity of wave fronts was measured from their spatial locations at specific times. In correlation curves of the 17 GHz (NoRH) radio emission we found a monotonous energy amplification of 3-min waves in the sunspot umbra before the 2012 June 7 flare. This dynamics agrees with an increase in the wave-train length in coronal loops (SDO/AIA, 171 {\AA}) reaching the maximum 30 minutes prior to the flare onset. A peculiarity of this flare time profile in soft X-rays (RHESSI, 3-25 keV) is maintaining the constant level of the flare emission for 10 minutes after the short impulse phase, which indicates at the energy release continuation. Throughout this time, we found 30-sec period transverse oscillations of the flare loop in the radio-frequency range (NoRH, 17 GHz). This periodicity is apparently related to the transformation of propagating longitudinal 3-min waves from the sunspot into the loop transverse oscillations. The magnetic field extrapolation showed the existence of the magnetic waveguide (loop) connecting the sunspot with the energy release region. A flare loop heating can be caused by the interaction (reconnections) of this transversally oscillating waveguide with the underlying twisted loops.