An analysis of solar-cycle temporal relationships among activity indicators Original Research Article

Differences in the time development of solar activity indices are an important clue in the search for physical processes responsible for changing solar emission at various wavelengths. In this paper we describe our investigation of temporal relationships among two space-based indices, Lyman-α 121.6 nm emission (Lα) and the Mg II 280 nm core-to-wing ratio, and four ground-based indices – the 10.7 cm flux (F10), the He I 1083 nm equivalent width, the Ca II K 393.4 nm emission index, and the International Sunspot Number (ISN). We provide scatterplots of index pairs passed through a 2-year Gaussian filter during each available solar cycle, and we approximate the temporal relationships quantitatively as overall temporal offsets with uncertainties. We reconcile our findings with qualitative ideas concerning the variation of solar emissions with solar activity. Since the F10 and ISN time series are longer than four complete solar cycles, we are able to evaluate the reproducibility of temporal offsets over multiple solar cycles. The chief motivation for our work is to improve solar indicator analysis by providing a method of seeing and analyzing temporal relationships clearly and easily. We believe that future physical models of magnetic activity and spectral emissions in the solar chromosphere and transition region may make quantitative predictions of temporal relationships among full-disk solar indices for comparison with analyses such as ours.