A peculiar young active region was observed in 1998 March with the Ultraviolet Coronagraph Spectrometer (UVCS) over the southwest limb. The spectra showed strong emission in the 974 line of fluorine-like iron, [Fe xviii], which is brightest at an electron temperature of 10 6.8 K, and lines of Ne ix, [Ca xiv], [Ca xv], Fe xvii, [Ni xiv], and [Ni xv]. It is the only active region so far observed to show such high temperatures 0.5 R above the solar limb. We derive the emission measure and estimate elemental abundances. The active region produced a number of coronal mass ejections (CMEs). After one CME on March 23, a bright post-CME arcade was seen in EIT and Yohkoh/SXT images. Between the arcade and the CME core, UVCS detected a very narrow, very hot feature, most prominently in the [Fe xviii] line. This feature seems to be the reconnection current sheet predicted by flux rope models of CMEs. Its thickness, luminosity, and duration seem to be consistent with the expectations of the flux rope models for CME. The elemental abundances in the bright feature are enhanced by a factor of 2 compared to those in the surrounding active region, i.e., a first ionization potential enhancement of 7-8 compared to the usual factor of 3-4.

Abstract. We have determined the location, in three dimensions, of eight quasi-stable coronal "streamers" from an analysis of Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) Large-Angle and Spectrometric Coronagraph images acquired over approximately one solar rotation. We use the locations to attempt to determine the solar origin of the streamers. Comparison of the streamers' locations (longitude and latitude at the R = 2.5 Rs source surface) with that of the current sheet computed from a potential source surface model show that all of the streamers lie in or near the heliospheric current sheet. We assume that the streamers coincide with magnetic field lines and use a potential source surface magnetic model to map the location of the streamers from the source surface (R = 2.5 Rs) to the photosphere. We find that many of the streamers are associated with strong magnetic field active regions. When a streamer and its associated active region are visible simultaneously, the active region is seen to be bright in the SOHO extreme ultraviolet imaging telescope (EIT) EUV full disk images. This, and other evidence, leads us to conclude that many of the bright streamers are the result of scattering from regions of enhanced density associated with active region outflow, and not a result of line-of-sight viewing through folds in a warped current sheet with uniform density.

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