VLA observations of a radio plage at centimeter wavelengths

VLA observations of a solar plage region at 6 and 20 cm wavelengths are presented. The high frequency 6 cm emission correlates well with the associated sunspots, whereas 20 cm emission shows good correlation with the H plage. Large temperature variations over a period of one day are observed in the plage associated component without any significant changes in the sunspots. The dominant emission mechanisms at 6 and 20 cm are found to be gyroresonance radiation and bremstrahlung respectively. It is concluded that the coronal condensation above the chromospheric H plage has an electron density of 5 × 10⁹ cm^–3 and it extends to a height of 5 × 10⁴ km.