Solar Particle Acceleration

Abstract

High-energy particles may be accelerated widely in stellar coronae; probably by the same processes we find in the Sun. Here, we have learned of two physical mechanisms that dominate the acceleration of solar energetic particles (SEPs). The highest energies and intensities are produced in "gradual" events at shock waves driven from the Sun by fast, wide coronal mass ejections (CMEs). Smaller, but more numerous, "impulsive" events with unusual particle composition are produced during magnetic reconnection in solar jets and flares. Jets provide open magnetic field lines where SEPs escape; closed magnetic loops contain this energy to produce bright, hot flares, perhaps even contributing to heating the low corona in profuse nanoflares. Streaming protons amplify Alfven waves upstream of the shocks. These waves scatter and trap SEPs and, in large events, modify the element abundances and flatten the low-energy spectra upstream. Shocks also reaccelerate residual ions from earlier impulsive events, when available, that characteristically dominate the energetic heavy-ion abundances. The large CME-driven shock waves develop an extremely wide longitude span, filling much of the inner heliosphere with energetic particles.