Related papers: Solar Irradiance Variability and Climate
The Sun has long been considered a constant star, to the extent that its total irradiance was termed the solar constant. It required radiometers in space to detect the small variations in solar irradiance on timescales of the solar rotation…
The sun's role in the earth's recent warming remains controversial even though there is a good deal of evidence to support the thesis that solar variations are a very significant factor in driving climate change both currently and in the…
Solar irradiance is considered one of the main natural factors affecting terrestrial climate, and its variations are included in most numerical models estimating the effects of natural versus anthropogenic factors for climate change. Solar…
Magnetic features on the surfaces of cool stars cause variations of their brightness. Such variations have been extensively studied for the Sun. Recent planet-hunting space telescopes allowed measuring brightness variations in hundred…
Recent precise observations of solar global parameters are used to calibrate an upgraded solar model which takes into account magnetic fields in the solar interior. Historical data about sunspot numbers (from 1500 to the present) and solar…
The variation in the radiative output of the Sun, described in terms of solar irradiance, is important to climatology. A common assumption is that solar irradiance variability is driven by its surface magnetism. Verifying this assumption…
The total amount of solar irradiance falling on the earth's surface is an important area of study amongst the photo-voltaic (PV) engineers and remote sensing analysts. The received solar irradiance impacts the total amount of generated…
The Sun provides the main energy input to the terrestrial atmosphere, and yet the impact of solar variability on long-term changes remains a controversial issue. Direct radiative forcing is the most studied mechanism. Other much weaker…
Although the occurrence of solar irradiance variations induced by magnetic surface features (e.g., sunspots, faculae, magnetic network) is generally accepted, the existence of intrinsic luminosity changes due to the internal magnetic fields…
Clouds cast shadows on the surface and locally enhance solar irradiance by absorbing and scattering sunlight, resulting in fast and large solar irradiance fluctuations on the surface. Typical spatiotemporal scales and driving mechanisms of…
The theory of stellar structure can be used to identify the most plausible mechanisms for the irradiance variations associated with the solar cycle. Changes in surface emissivity, i.e. the reduced cooling in spots and enhanced emission by…
The total and spectral irradiance varies over short time scales, i.e. from days to months, and longer time scales from years to decades, centuries, and beyond. In this talk we review the current understanding of irradiance changes from days…
The Sun's net radiative output varies on timescales of minutes to gigayears. Direct measurements of the total solar irradiance (TSI) show changes in the spatially- and spectrally-integrated radiant energy on timescales as short as minutes…
Surface solar irradiance varies on scales as small as seconds or meters due to scattering and absorption by the atmosphere. Clouds are the main driver of this variability, but moisture structures in the atmospheric boundary layer and…
Evaluating the magnitude of natural climate variations is important because it can greatly affect future climate policies. As an example, we examine the influence of changes in solar activity (solar wind in particular) on surface…
The correlation between solar irradiance and the 11-year solar activity cycle is evident in the body of measurements made from space, which extend over the past four decades. Models relating variation in solar irradiance to photospheric…
Whereas a variation of the solar luminosity, L, will inevitably cause a similar change of the total solar irradiance, S, the opposite is not true. In fact, the bulk of the days to months variations of S can be explained entirely in terms of…
The influence of solar variability on climate is currently uncertain. Recent observations have indicated a possible mechanism via the influence of solar modulated cosmic rays on global cloud cover. Surprisingly the influence of solar…
Variation in total solar irradiance is thought to have little effect on the Earth's surface temperature because of the thermal time constant--the characteristic response time of the Earth's global surface temperature to changes in forcing.…
The magnetic cycle of the Sun, as manifested in the cyclic appearance of sunspots, significantly influences our space environment and space-based technologies by generating what is now termed as space weather. Long-term variation in the…