Sorry for all the confusion with the earlier flowchart e-mail. We have
tracked down the source of the problem. To prevent "spoofing," NRL
blocks all e-mail coming from an outside source (the MSU listserve) with
an NRL address (mine). Hence, no one at NRL received the message. Our
networking people have now included the listserve as a special
exception, so the problem should not occur again. I'm attaching the
flowchart here for the benefit of the NRL folks.
I've received a request for information on what "over densities" are all
about. A discussion and references can be found in Section 7.1 (p. 62)
of the attached paper.
Sorry again,
Jim
Dear Loop Lovers,
A number of you have expressed interest in a flowchart I showed at
the Loops III Workshop that deals with the isothermal/multi-thermal
issue, so I am attaching a copy here. It tries to present the reasoning
behind the conclusion that some loops must be multi-thermal (composed of
unresolved, impulsively-heated strands at different temperatures). The
boxes with blue type contain questions that can be answered
observationally. Depending on the answers, an isothermal interpretation
might be reasonable. However, if the answers lead to the lower-right
corner of the chart, then there is a major inconsistency and therefore
something fundamental that we do not understand.
At the time of the workshop, there was a question of whether the
observed over densities can be explained by thermal nonequilibrium (the
lack of equilibrium when steady heating is sufficiently highly
concentrated near the footpoints). I can now confirm that it can.
However, whether the other observational properties can also be
explained is currently being investigated.
Best wishes,
Jim
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James A. Klimchuk
Space Science Division
Naval Research Lab
Washington, DC 20375
USA
klimchuk(a)nrl.navy.mil
Phone: 202-404-8136
Fax: 202-404-7997
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