Dependence of Solar supergranular lifetime on surface magnetic activity and rotation

Abstract

The lifetimes and length-scales for supergranular cells in active and quiescent regions of the Solar chromosphere, and the relation between the two, were studied using a time series of Ca II K filtergrams. The lifetimes, in contrast to supergranular length scale and fractal dimension, show no significant dependence on Solar latitude, suggesting that cell lifetimes are independent of the differential rotation and a possible supergranular super-rotation. The functional form of the relation was obtained guided by a comparison of the distributions of the two supergranular parameters. We infer a linear dependence of cell lifetime on area, which can be understood by the assumption of the network's evolution via a diffusion of the magnetic field. Our analysis suggests that the diffusion rate in quiet regions is about 10% greater than in active regions.