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Abstract
We analyze the record of facular areas compiled by the Royal Greenwich Observatory (RGO) from daily white-light observations between 1874 and 1976. Curiously, the relative amplitudes of the three largest sunspot cycles 17, 18, and 19 in this record are reversed when they are ranked by facular area. We show that this negative correlation arises from a general decrease of the ratioAF/AS, of facular to sunspot area, with increasingAS. Within a given cycle,AF/ASdecreases in active regions of largeAS, butAF/ASis also lower at allAS, in cycles of higher peak amplitude inAS. This decrease ofAF/ASin large spot groups is consistent with its decrease in younger, more active solar-mass stars, and it may explain why stars only slightly more magnetically active than the Sun tend to exhibit much greater variability in broad-band photometry. We suggest that the physical explanation is an increased spatial filling factor of magnetic flux, favoring formation of sunspots over faculae. We also explain why the decrease inAF/ASis not seen in the disc-integrated Ca K plage areas, nor in theF10.7 microwave index, both of which exhibit remarkable linearity when plotted against smoothed sunspot area. This explanation suggests how complementary data on faculae and plages from RGO and Mt. Wilson could be used to improve empirical models of total irradiance variation, extending back to 1874.
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Cambridge Research and Instrumentation, Inc., 02139, Cambridge, MA, USA
Peter Foukal
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Foukal, P. The curious case of the greenwich faculae.Sol Phys148, 219–232 (1993). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00645087
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