# Radiative Transfer Effects and Convective Collapse: Size(flux)-Strength Distribution for the Small-scale Solar Magnetic Flux Tubes

## 1. Introduction

One of the important properties of the small-scale solar magnetic structures, as established by the observations(Stenflo and Harvey 1985, Zayer et al 1989,1990; Schussler 1991), is that while the strong field $`network`$ $`elements`$ have field strengths very weakly dependent on the flux per element, $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$, with typical values of $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ about $`1\times 10^{18}`$ Mx and higher, the $`inner`$ $`network`$ weak field structures have a typical value of about $`500`$ G(Keller et al 1994, Solanki et al 1996, Lin 1995) for their strength and $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ about $`1\times 10^{17}`$ Mx or lower with a strong dependence between the two. If the convective collapse of a weak field tube is the global process responsible for the formation of the strong field tubes(Parker 1978; Webb and Roberts 1978; Spruit and Zweibel 1979; Spruit 1979; Hasan 1983, 1984;Venkatakrishnan 1985; Steiner 1996), that comprise the $`network`$, with strengths weakly dependent on $`\mathrm{\Phi }`$ then it should be explained why tubes with smaller fluxes viz., the $`inner`$ $`network`$ elements do not collapse to kG strength; efficient radiative exchange with the surroundings by a small flux tube(Hasan 1986; Venkatakrishnan 1986) offers a natural explanation; here, having in mind a quantitative comparison with the above mentioned observationally established properties of the Solar flux tubes, we employ a semi-empirical model of the photospheric and the convection zone structure of the Sun and study in detail the effects of radiation on the convective instability and the wave motions.

## 2. Equations

We add to the familiar thin flux tube equations(Roberts and Webb,1978) the following non-adiabatic energy equation(see e.g.,Cox 1980),

$$\frac{p}{t}+v\frac{p}{z}\frac{\mathrm{\Gamma }_1p}{\rho }\left[\frac{\rho }{t}+v\frac{\rho }{z}\right]=\frac{\chi _T}{\rho c_vT}.𝐅$$
(1)   
where $`p`$, $`\rho `$, and $`𝐅`$ denote the fluid pressure, density, and radiative energy flux respectively; (see Cox(1980) for the definitions of other thermodynamic quantities); all the variables are evaluated on the tube axis(r=0); The radiative flux $`𝐅`$ is calculated in the generalised Eddington approximation following Unno and Spiegel(1967): the mean intensity $`J`$ that is needed to evaluate the flux,

$$𝐅_R=\frac{4}{3\kappa \rho }J$$
(2)   
is found by reducing the exact relation

$$.𝐅_R=4\kappa \rho (SJ)$$
(3)   
to a form appropriate for a thin tube, which reads,

$$\frac{1}{3}\frac{^2J}{\tau ^2}+\frac{4}{3}\left(\frac{J_eJ}{\tau _a^2}\right)=JS$$
(4)   
where $`d\tau =\kappa \rho dz`$, $`\tau _a=\kappa \rho a`$, $`S`$ is the source function which we take it to be the Planck function, $`a`$ is the tube radius, and $`J_e`$ is the mean intensity in the external medium. $`J_e`$ is found by solving the equation

$$\frac{1}{3}\frac{^2J_e}{\tau _e^2}=J_eS_e$$
(5)   
### 2.1. Equilibrium

The equilibrium stratification of the external medium that we use here is the one determined to match the combined $`VALC`$(Vernazza et al. 1981) and Spruit(1977) models (see Hasan,Kneer and Kalkofen(1998) for details about the construction of this external quite Sun model); the Rosseland mean opacities are calculated by interpolation from the tables of Kurucz(1993) for the upper layers and from those of Rogers and Iglesias(1992) for the deeper regions. We assume temperature equilibrium, $`T=T_e`$, which implies that $`\beta `$, defined as $`\beta =8\pi p/B^2`$, is constant with z(if the dependence of $`\mu `$ is neglected). The pressure and density are thus determined from

$`p={\displaystyle \frac{\beta }{1+\beta }}p_e`$ (6)   
$`\rho ={\displaystyle \frac{\beta }{1+\beta }}\rho _e`$ (7)   
The extent of the flux tube covers the atmosphere from the temperature minimum in the chromosphere to $`5000`$km deep in the convection zone with the photospheric surface($`\tau =1`$) being assigned $`z=0`$. We measure the positive $`z`$ downwards.

### 2.2. Linear Stability: The Perturbation Equations

With the assumption that the perturbations in the ambient medium are negligible small perturbations inside the tube about the equilibrium described above obey the following equations in the linear limit:

$$\frac{\xi }{z}=\frac{B^{^{}}}{B}\frac{\rho ^{^{}}}{\rho }\left[\frac{d(\mathrm{ln}\rho )}{dz}\frac{d(\mathrm{ln}B)}{dz}\right]\xi $$
(8)   
$$\frac{^2\xi }{t^2}=Hg\frac{}{z}\left(\frac{p^{^{}}}{p}\right)g\left(\frac{p^{^{}}}{p}\frac{\rho ^{^{}}}{\rho }\right)$$
(9)   
$$\frac{B^{^{}}}{B}=\frac{\beta }{2}\frac{p^{^{}}}{p}$$
(10)   
$$\frac{}{t}\left(\frac{p^{^{}}}{p}\right)\mathrm{\Gamma }_1\frac{}{t}\left(\frac{\rho ^{^{}}}{\rho }\right)+\left[\frac{d\mathrm{ln}p}{dz}\mathrm{\Gamma }_1\frac{d\mathrm{ln}\rho }{dz}\right]\frac{\xi }{t}=\frac{\chi _T}{\rho c_vT}.𝐅^{^{}}$$
(11)   
where $`\xi `$ denotes the vertical displacement and $`H`$ is the pressure scale height. the perturbation of equation (3) can be done in a straightforward manner:

$$.𝐅_𝐑^{^{}}=\frac{dF_R^{^{}}}{dz}=4\pi \kappa _a\rho (S^{^{}}J^{^{}})+.𝐅_𝐑\left(\frac{\kappa ^{^{}}}{\kappa }+\frac{\rho ^{^{}}}{\rho }\right)$$
(12)   
The perturbation in the mean intensity $`J^{^{}}`$ is determined by perturbing and linearizing the transfer equation (4) which in the first order moment form are

$$\frac{d}{dz}\left(\frac{J^{^{}}}{J}\right)=\frac{dlnJ}{dz}\frac{\eta ^{^{}}}{\eta }\frac{dlnJ}{dz}\frac{J^{^{}}}{J}+\frac{dlnJ}{dz}\frac{^{^{}}}{}$$
(13)   
$`{\displaystyle \frac{d}{dz}}\left({\displaystyle \frac{^{^{}}}{}}\right)=\left({\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_t}{2ϵH_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{dln}{dz}}\right){\displaystyle \frac{\eta ^{^{}}}{\eta }}+{\displaystyle \frac{\mathrm{\Delta }_t}{2ϵH_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{a^{^{}}}{a}}{\displaystyle \frac{(1+_c)(4+3\tau _a^2)}{16ϵH_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{J^{^{}}}{J}}+`$   
$`{\displaystyle \frac{1}{qH_p}}{\displaystyle \frac{T^{^{}}}{T}}{\displaystyle \frac{dln}{dz}}{\displaystyle \frac{^{^{}}}{}}`$ (14)   
where $`=𝐅/4`$ is the Eddington flux, $`\eta =\kappa \rho `$, $`H_p`$ is the pressure scale-height at the bottom and the various other quantities are as defined below:

$$_c=\frac{J}{S}1$$
(15)   
is a measure of departure from radiative equilibrium,

$$\mathrm{\Delta }_t=\frac{JJ_e}{S}$$
(16)   
is the ratio of the excess of the mean intensity inside the tube to the Planck function; $`ϵ`$ and $`q`$ are the ratios,

$$ϵ=\frac{\tau _r}{\tau _{th}}$$
(17)   
$$q=\frac{\tau _N}{\tau _{th}}$$
(18)   
where

$$\tau _{th}=\frac{\rho c_vTH_p}{}$$
(19)   
is the radiative relaxation time over the length of one pressure scale-height at the bottom,

$$\tau _r=\frac{\rho c_va^2}{K},K=\frac{16\sigma T^3}{3\kappa \rho }$$
(20)   
is the radiative relaxation time across the tube in the optically thick limit and

$$\tau _N=\frac{c_vT}{4\kappa S}$$
(21)   
is the radiative relaxation time that one obtains in the optically thin limit (with $`Newton^{}s`$ $`law`$ $`of`$ $`cooling`$)(Spiegel,1957); and,

$$\tau _a=\kappa \rho a$$
(22)   
is the depth dependent optical thickness of the tube. We reduce the perturbation equations to a final set of four equations for the four variables $`\xi `$, $`p^{^{}}/p`$, $`J^{^{}}/J`$ and $`^{^{}}/`$. The optically thick reduction of the set of equations corresponds to taking the limit $`\tau `$ tending to infinity and replacing the mean intensity by the Planck function. The optically thin case is got in the limit $`\tau _{th}`$ approaching zero.

### 2.3. Boundary Conditions

We use closed mechanical boundary conditions and as thermal conditions we impose that there is no incoming radiation from above at the top boundary and that the perturbations are adiabatic at the bottom boundary.

## 3. Results and Discussion

The action of radiation that we bring out in this study of convective instability and wave-motions of the tube is explained conveniently with the help of the graphs shown in $`figs.(1)`$ and $`(2)`$ where we plot the growth rates and frequencies of the fundamental mode, which is the most unstable, respectively, as a function of the surface tube radius $`a_0`$ for various values of the plasma $`\beta `$.

### 3.1. Convective Instability

The onset of the convective instability corresponds to the cusps in the curves of $`fig.(1)`$ where the overstable mode’s frequency becomes zero and the growth rate shoots up sharply. Comparison with the results obtained with only the lateral exchange in the diffusion approximation (Venkatakrishnan 1986, Hasan 1986) or in the Newton’s law of cooling reveal that these earlier treatments overestimate the degree of instability: the growth rates obtained with the present more accurate treatment of radiation with the inclusion of vertical exchange of radiation are appreciably smaller; moreover, for a given value of $`\beta `$, i.e. for a tube of given strength the onset of convective instability requires the size of the tube to be greater in the present case than that is required when the diffusion approximation is used.

The convective instability is completely suppressed for tubes with the plasma $`\beta `$ smaller than $`2.45`$ whatever be its size; this corresponds to a field strength of about $`1160`$Gauss at $`\tau =1`$ inside the tube; this has to be compared with the value of $`1350`$G($`\beta =1.83`$) that Spruit and Zweibel obtained in the adiabatic case. We point out here that the field strength of $`1160`$G that we obtain here does not necessarily imply that all collapsing tubes of weaker fields will attain this unique value and become stable; this value represents a necessary strength for stability against convective collapse and thus can be considered as a minimum strength for stability; a collapsing weaker tube of sufficient size can of course attain an equilibrium collapsed state of field strength higher than this value(cf. Spruit 1979).

### 3.2. Size-strength Distribution for the Solar Tubes

From the positions of the cusps in the curves of $`fig.(1)`$, i.e. from the positions that mark the onset of the convective instability we pick up the values of the plasma $`\beta `$ and the radius $`a_0`$; the resulting radius-field strength dependence is shown in $`fig.(3)`$; the corresponding flux-strength distribution in $`fig.(4)`$. Comparison of this curve with those observationally produced(Solanki et al 1997, Lin 1996) shows a remarkable agreement leading to the conclusion that indeed the convective collapse is the cause of the formation of the flux elements on the Sun’s surface. Our refined, realistic, and exact treatment of the convective collapse process on the Sun reinforces the conclusions drawn from earlier simplified treatments(Venkatakrishnan 1986, Hasan 1986) and verifies the original suggestion and the physical explanation by Parker(1978) for the concentrated small scale magnetic structures on the Sun.

### 3.3. Overstability

The characteristics of the overstable mode are explained with the help of the $`fig.(1)`$ again; the growth rates in the present Eddington approximation are lower than those obtained in the earlier treatments where the vertical losses are not taken care of and use either the diffusion approximation or the Newton’s law of cooling; the differences thus demonstrate that overstability is hindered by the vertical losses

We point out that while there is no damping out of oscillations when only lateral exchange takes place and the oscillations’ growth rate only asymptotically goes to zero in the limit of large radii, i.e. in the adiabatic limit, the inclusion of vertical radiative losses make the oscillations to damp out for radii greater than a particular finite value which is determined by the $`\beta `$; thus it is clarified that the horizontal exchange between vertically oscillating fluid elements acts to amplify the oscillations while the vertical losses always try to smooth out the fluctuations thereby introducing damping; this $`radiative`$ $`damping`$ is quite severe for the overstable mode of an intense flux tube on the Sun that it gets completely damped out for tubes of radii larger than a certain critical value.

Finally we note that a tube which can undergo convective collapse for radii greater than a critical value for a given field strength remains overstable for all smaller radii that it can take.

## 4. Conclusions

* We have demonstrated that radiative transport has a marked effect on the size-field strength relation for solar flux tubes. Our results can be be applied to solar flux tubes more reliably in view of the more refined treatment of radiative transfer.
* We have generalized the necessary condition for the onset of convective instability in the presence of radiative energy exchange. We find that radiation has a stabilizing influence which is greater for tubes with small radius.
* Overstability of the longitudinal slow mode is shown to be dependent on the tube radius: there is a critical tube radius above which a strong field convectively stable tube’s oscillations get damped as a result of vertical radiative losses.

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