Progress in coronal physics

This paper reviews research highlights of the past five years. Considerable progress has been made in observing and interpreting coronal mass ejections. The stability of coronal loops is much better understood and new observations of the onset of wind streams in coronal holes have been made. Observations from the Solar Maximum Mission should helpt to clarify the physics of the active corona.The mechanisms that heat the corona and accelerate the high-speed wind streams remain to be identified, however.Operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under contract with the National Science Foundation.     

Principal components in active galactic nuclei variability data and the estimation of the flux contributions from different components

It has been found that the near-infrared flux variations of Seyfert galaxies satisfy relations of the form   F_i ≈α _{i j} +β _{i j} F_j   , where F_i , F_j are the fluxes in filters i and j ; and  α _{i , j} , β _{i , j}   are constants. These relations have been used to estimate the constant contributions of the non-variable underlying galaxies. The paper attempts a formal treatment of the estimation procedure, allowing for the possible presence of a third component, namely non-variable hot dust. In an analysis of a sample of 38 Seyfert galaxies, inclusion of the hot dust component improves the model fit in approximately half the cases. All derived dust temperatures are below 300 K, in the range 540–860 K or above 1300 K. A noteworthy feature is the estimation of confidence intervals for the component contributions: this is achieved by bootstrapping. It is also pointed out that the model implies that such data could be fruitfully analysed in terms of principal components.     

Bending waves and the structure of Saturn's rings

The surface mass density profiles at four locations within Saturn's rings are calculated using Voyager spacecraft images of spiral bending waves. Bending waves are vertical corrugations in Saturn's rings which are excited at vertical resonances of a moon, e.g., Mimas, whose orbit is inclined with respect to the mean plane of the rings. Bending waves propagate toward Saturn by virtue of the rings' self-gravity; their wavelength depends on the local surface mass density of the rings. Observations of bending waves can thus be used to determine the surface density in regions of Saturn's rings near vertical resonances. The average surface density of the outer B ring near Mimas' 4:2 inner vertical resonance is 54 ± 10 g cm^?2. Surface density in this region probably varies by ～ 30% over radial length scales of tens of kilometers; and irregular radial structure is present on similar length scales in this region. Surface densities ranging from 24 g cm^?2 to 45 g cm^?2 are found in the A ring. Small scale variations in surface density are not seen in the A ring, consistent with its more uniform optical appearance.     

Canonical solution of the two critical argument problem

The solution by Sessin and Ferraz-Mello (Celes. Mech. 32, 307–332) of the Hori auxiliary system for the motion of two planets with periods nearly commensurate in the ratio 21 is considerably simplified by the introduction of canonical variables. An analogous canonical transformation simplifies the elliptic restricted problem.     

Chaotic behavior and the origin of the 31 Kirkwood gap

The sudden eccentricity increases discovered by J. Wisdom (Astron J.87, 577–593, 1982) are reproduced in numerical integrations of the planar-elliptic restricted three-body problem, verifying that this phenomenon is real. Maximum Lyapunov characteristic exponents for trajectories near the $\text{3}\text{1}$ commensurability are computed both with the mappings presented in Wisdom (1982) and by numerical integration of the planar-elliptic problem. In all cases the agreement is excellent, indicating that the mappings accurately reflect whether trajectories are chaotic or quasiperiodic. The mappings are used to trace out the chaotic zone near the $\text{3}\text{1}$ commensurability, both in the planar-elliptic problem and to a more limited extent in the three-dimensional elliptic problem. The outer boundary of the chaotic zone coincides with the boundary of the $\text{3}\text{1}$ Kirkwood gap in the actual distribution of asteroids within the errors of the asteroid orbital elements.