2006
DOI: 10.1086/510406
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A Virial Theorem Investigation of Magnetic Variations in the Sun

Abstract: The magnetic virial theorem is applied here to a long-standing astrophysical problem, namely, the sign of the Sun's radius change during the solar activity cycle. The solar radius is theoretically found to decrease around the time of maximum magnetic field strength, in agreement with the best available observational evidence. This theoretical prediction, although simply based, instills some confidence by explicitly satisfying the conservation of total energy.

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Cited by 17 publications
(21 citation statements)
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“…Lefebvre & Kosovichev 2005;Noël 2005). The theory predicts that R will increase with decreased solar magnetic field (Stothers 2006), and this accords with some of the best observations. This gives the wrong sense of change to contribute to the centennial GMAST rise, and the observed solar cycle changes are at least two orders of magnitude too small to explain the observed magnitude of the GMAST change (as discussed in §2).…”
Section: Solar Radius Changessupporting
confidence: 85%
“…Lefebvre & Kosovichev 2005;Noël 2005). The theory predicts that R will increase with decreased solar magnetic field (Stothers 2006), and this accords with some of the best observations. This gives the wrong sense of change to contribute to the centennial GMAST rise, and the observed solar cycle changes are at least two orders of magnitude too small to explain the observed magnitude of the GMAST change (as discussed in §2).…”
Section: Solar Radius Changessupporting
confidence: 85%
“…Stothers' idea (Stothers 2006) explains the effect with the influence of local transient magnetic fields excited by the turbulent convection. The first quantitative tests of this idea found serious inconsistencies between the theory and observations Molnár et al 2012a).…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…If energy is stored in this reservoir, it will result a change in the Sun's radius, at least in the uppermost layers of the Sun (the leptocline). Recent works show the compatibility of this theory with irradiance variations (Lefebvre and Kosovichev, 2005;Stothers, 2006;Fazel et al, 2008). These mechanisms act at the level of days to several years (cyclic solar activity).…”
Section: The Key Role Of Time Rangingmentioning
confidence: 86%