Magnetic reconnection as the cause of a photospheric canceling feature and mass flows in a filament

Magnetic reconnection in the temperature minimum region of the solar photosphere can account for the canceling magnetic features on the Sun. Litvinenko (1999a) showed that a reconnection model explains the quiet-Sun features with the magnetic flux cancelation rate of order 10¹⁷ Mx hr⁻¹. In this paper the model is applied to cancelation in solar active regions, which is characterized by a much larger rate of cancelation ∖ ge10¹⁹ Mx hr⁻¹. In particular, the evolution of a photospheric canceling feature observed in an active region on July 2, 1994 is studied. The theoretical predictions are demonstrated to be in reasonable agreement with the measured speed of approaching magnetic fragments, the magnetic field in the fragments, and the flux cancelation rate, deduced from the combined Big Bear Hα time-lapse images and videomagnetograms calibrated against the daily NSO/Kitt Peak magnetogram. Of particular interest is the prediction that photospheric reconnection should lead to a significant upward mass flux and the formation of a solar filament. Hα observations indeed showed a filament that had one of its ends spatially superposed with the canceling feature. Supplementary material to this paper is available in electronic form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A:1005284116353