English

Data-constrained magnetohydrodynamic simulation of global solar corona including solar wind effects within 2.5 $R_\odot$

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics 2025-11-26 v1

Abstract

Total solar eclipses (TSEs) provide a unique opportunity to observe the large-scale solar corona. The solar wind plays an important role in forming the large-scale coronal structure and magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations are used to reproduce it for further studying coronal mass ejections (CMEs). We conduct a data-constrained MHD simulation of the global solar corona including solar wind effects of the 2024 April 8 TSE with observed magnetograms using the Message Passing Interface Adaptive Mesh Refinement Versatile Advection Code (MPI-AMRVAC) within 2.5 RR_\odot. This TSE happened within the solar maximum, hence the global corona was highly structured. Our MHD simulation includes the energy equation with a reduced polytropic index γ=1.05\gamma=1.05. We compare the global magnetic field for multiple magnetograms and use synchronic frames from the Solar Dynamics Observatory/Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager to initialize the magnetic field configuration from a magneto-frictionally equilibrium solution, called the Outflow field. We detail the initial and boundary conditions employed to time-advance the full set of ideal MHD equations such that the global corona is relaxed to a steady state. The magnetic field, the velocity field, and distributions of the density and thermal pressure are successfully reproduced. We demonstrate direct comparisons with TSE images in white-light and Fe XIV emission augmented with quasi-separatrix layers, the integrated current density, and the synthetic white-light radiation, and find a good agreement between simulations and observations. This provides a fundamental background for future simulations to study the triggering and acceleration mechanisms of CMEs under solar wind effects.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2511.19975,
  title  = {Data-constrained magnetohydrodynamic simulation of global solar corona including solar wind effects within 2.5 $R_\odot$},
  author = {Yihua Li and Guoyin Chen and Jinhan Guo and Yang Guo and Hao Wu and Yuhao Huang and Xin Cheng and Mingde Ding and Rony Keppens},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2511.19975},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

29 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ