The area distribution of solar magnetic bright points

Crockett, Philip, Mathioudakis, Mihalis, Jess, David, Shelyag, Sergiy, Keenan, Francis and Christian, Damian (2010) The area distribution of solar magnetic bright points. The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 722 (2). L188-L193. ISSN 2041-8205

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Abstract

Magnetic bright points (MBPs) are among the smallest observable objects on the solar photosphere. A combination of G-band observations and numerical simulations is used to determine their area distribution. An automatic detection algorithm, employing one-dimensional intensity profiling, is utilized to identify these structures in the observed and simulated data sets. Both distributions peak at an area of ≈45,000 km2, with a sharp decrease toward smaller areas. The distributions conform with log-normal statistics, which suggests that flux fragmentation dominates over flux convergence. Radiative magneto-convection simulations indicate an independence in the MBP area distribution for differing magnetic flux densities. The most commonly occurring bright point size corresponds to the typical width of inter-granular lanes.

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