Origin and Evolution of Filament-Prominence Systems

We present a "head-to-tail" linkage model for the formation, evolution, and eruption of solar filaments. The magnetic field structure of our model is based on the observation that filaments form exclusively in filament channels with no apparent magnetic connections above the polarity inversion line. The formation of a filament in this configuration is driven by flux convergence and cancellation, which produces looplike filament segments with a half-turn. Filament segments of like chirality may connect and form long quiescent filaments. Such filaments are stabilized through footpoint anchoring until further cancellation at the footpoints causes their eruption. The eruption restores the original filament channel so that filament formation may resume immediately. We then demonstrate that the combined workings of Hale's polarity law, Joy's law, and differential rotation introduce a strong hemispheric preference in the chirality of filaments formed poleward of the sunspot belt, which is in agreement with observations. We analyze the magnetic fine structure of filaments formed through our model and find consistency with the observed hemispheric preference for barb orientation and a simple explanation for barb formation. Finally, we consider the flux tubes retracted below the surface in the process of filament formation. We show that every cancellation event that generates a filament obeying the hemispheric chirality preference injects a flux tube below the surface with a poloidal field opposite that of the ongoing cycle. We suggest that this pattern of submergence of flux represents the specific mechanism for the reversal of the poloidal flux in a Babcock-Leighton-Durney-type model for the solar dynamo.

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