Exploring the Solar Wind from Its Source on the Corona into the Inner Heliosphere during the First Solar Orbiter–Parker Solar Probe Quadrature

Daniele Telloni , Vincenzo Andretta , Ester Antonucci , Alessandro Bemporad , Giuseppe Capuano , Silvano Fineschi , Silvio Giordano , Shadia Habbal , Denise Perrone , Rui Pinto (1) , Luca Sorriso-Valvo , Daniele Spadaro , Roberto Susino , Lloyd Woodham , Gary Zank , Marco Romoli , Stuart Bale , Justin Kasper , Frédéric Auchère (2) , Roberto Bruno , Gerardo Capobianco , Anthony Case , Chiara Casini , Marta Casti , Paolo Chioetto , Alain Corso , Vania da Deppo , Yara de Leo , Thierry Dudok de Wit (3) , Federica Frassati , Fabio Frassetto , Keith Goetz , Salvo Guglielmino , Peter Harvey , Petr Heinzel , Giovanna Jerse , Kelly Korreck , Federico Landini , Davin Larson , Alessandro Liberatore , Roberto Livi , Robert Macdowall , Enrico Magli , David Malaspina , Giuseppe Massone , Mauro Messerotti , John Moses , Giampiero Naletto , Gianalfredo Nicolini , Giuseppe Nisticò , Olga Panasenco , Maurizio Pancrazzi , Maria Pelizzo , Marc Pulupa , Fabio Reale , Paolo Romano , Clementina Sasso , Udo Schühle , Marco Stangalini , Michael Stevens , Leonard Strachan , Thomas Straus , Luca Teriaca , Michela Uslenghi , Marco Velli , Daniel Verscharen , Cosimo Volpicelli , Phyllis Whittlesey , Luca Zangrilli , Gaetano Zimbardo , Paola Zuppella

1 IRAP - Institut de recherche en astrophysique et planétologie
2 IAS - Institut d'astrophysique spatiale
3 LPC2E - Laboratoire de Physique et Chimie de l'Environnement et de l'Espace

This Letter addresses thefirst Solar Orbiter(SO)–Parker Solar Probe(PSP)quadrature, occurring on 2021 January18 to investigate the evolution of solar wind from the extended corona to the inner heliosphere. Assuming ballisticpropagation, the same plasma volume observed remotely in the corona at altitudes between 3.5 and 6.3 solar radiiabove the solar limb with the Metis coronagraph on SO can be tracked to PSP, orbiting at 0.1 au, thus allowing thelocal properties of the solar wind to be linked to the coronal source region from where it originated. Thanks to theclose approach of PSP to the Sun and the simultaneous Metis observation of the solar corona, theflow-alignedmagneticfield and the bulk kinetic energyflux density can be empirically inferred along the coronal current sheetwith an unprecedented accuracy, allowing in particular estimation of the Alfvén radius at 8.7 solar radii during thetime of this event. This is thus the veryfirst study of the same solar wind plasma as it expands from the sub-Alfvénic solar corona to just above the Alfvén surface

Domains: Astrophysics [astro-ph]

Daniele Telloni, Vincenzo Andretta, Ester Antonucci, Alessandro Bemporad, Giuseppe Capuano, et al.. Exploring the Solar Wind from Its Source on the Corona into the Inner Heliosphere during the First Solar Orbiter–Parker Solar Probe Quadrature. The Astrophysical journal letters, 2021, 920 (1), pp.L14. ⟨10.3847/2041-8213/ac282f⟩. ⟨insu-03440357⟩