Related papers: The Thomson Surface. II. Polarization
The solar corona, the tenuous outer atmosphere of the Sun, is orders of magnitude hotter than the solar surface. This 'coronal heating problem' requires the identification of a heat source to balance losses due to thermal conduction,…
Electromagnetic wave scattering off density inhomogeneities in the solar corona is an important process which determines both the apparent source size and the time profile of radio bursts observed at 1 AU. Here we model the scattering…
Scattering of light from an anisotropic source produces linear polarization in spectral lines and the continuum. In the outer layers of a stellar atmosphere the anisotropy of the radiation field is typically dominated by the radiation…
The distribution of the coronal electron density at different distances from the Sun strongly influences the physical processes in the solar corona and is therefore a very important topic in solar physics. Most methods, including radio…
X-ray radiation from neutron stars manifests itself in a variety of settings. Isolated pulsars, and magnetars both exhibit quasi-thermal persistent soft X-ray emission from their surfaces. Transient magnetospheric bursts from magnetars and…
We examine the polarization signal of the cosmic microwave background radiation associated with distant clusters. The polarization is induced by the Thomson scattering of microwave photons with ionized gas of clusters and contains…
We evaluate the large scale polarization of the cosmic microwave background induced, via Thomson scattering prior to decoupling, by nearly scale-invariant spectra of scalar and tensor metric perturbations, such as those predicted by most…
A major goal of proposed future space observatories, such as the Habitable World Observatory, is to directly image and characterize Earth-like planets around Sun-like stars to search for habitability signatures requiring the starlight…
In helioseismic studies, an observational parameter of primary concern is the P-angle, the angle along which lies the solar axis of rotation for a given image. For the six observing sites employed by The Global Oscillation Network Group…
The study of polarized radiation transfer in the highly-magnetized surface locales of neutron stars is of great interest to the understanding of accreting X-ray pulsars, rotation-powered pulsars and magnetars. This paper explores scattering…
Since the Lalpha rocket observations of (Gabriel, Solar Phys. 21, 392, 1971), it has been realized that the hydrogen (H) lines could be observed in the corona and offer an interesting diagnostic for the temperature, density, and radial…
It is argued that depolarization of solar radio bursts requires reflection off boundary layers no thicker than about a wavelength (a few meters at most) between regions with large density ratios. The implied inhomogeneities suggest that the…
Since in situ studies and interplanetary dust collections only provide a spatially limited amount of information about the interplanetary dust properties, it is of major importance to complete these studies with properties inferred from…
We investigate the phenomenology of nonlinear Compton scattering of polarised photons by unpolarised electrons in plane-wave backgrounds. The energy and angular spectra of polarised photons are calculated for linearly- and…
Context. We present a theoretical review of the effect of impact polarization of a hydrogen H$\alpha$ line due to an expected proton beam bombardment in solar flares. Aims. Several observations indicate the presence of the linear…
We consider radiative corrections to polarization observables in elastic electron-proton scattering, in particular, for the polarization transfer measurements of the proton form factor ratio $\mu G_E/G_M$. The corrections are of two types:…
We have obtained the first time-resolved, disc-integrated observations of Earth's poles with the Deep Impact spacecraft as part of the EPOXI Mission of Opportunity. These data mimic what we will see when we point next-generation space…
Multiply connected space sections of the universe on a scale smaller than the horizon size can leave an imprint on cosmic microwave background polarization maps, in such a way that the so-called ``circles-in-the-sky'' method can be used to…
Plumes have been proposed to channel MHD waves and the solar wind into the heliosphere. High-speed propagating disturbances (PDs), though well detected in plumes, cannot yet be clearly assigned to MHD waves or to mass flows. Additionally,…
Measuring the temperature structure of the solar atmosphere is critical to understanding how it is heated to high temperatures. Unfortunately, the temperature of the upper atmosphere cannot be observed directly, but must be inferred from…