We report the first science results from the newly completed Expanded Owens Valley Solar Array (EOVSA), which obtained excellent microwave imaging spectroscopy observations of SOL2017-09-10, a classic partially-occulted solar limb flare associated with an erupting flux rope. This event is also well-covered by the Reuven Ramaty High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Imager (RHESSI) in hard X-rays (HXRs). We present an overview of this event focusing on microwave and HXR data, both associated with high-energy nonthermal electrons, and discuss them within the context of the flare geometry and evolution revealed by extreme ultraviolet (EUV) observations from the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly aboard the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO/AIA). The EOVSA and RHESSI data reveal the evolving spatial and energy distribution of high-energy electrons throughout the entire flaring region. The results suggest that the microwave and HXR sources largely arise from a common nonthermal electron population, although the microwave imaging spectroscopy provides information over a much larger volume of the corona.

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Solar flares are powered by a rapid release of energy in the solar corona, thought to be produced by the decay of the coronal magnetic field strength. Direct quantitative measurements of the evolving magnetic field strength are required to test this. We report microwave observations of a solar flare, showing spatial and temporal changes in the coronal magnetic field. The field decays at a rate of ~5 Gauss per second for 2 minutes, as measured within a flare subvolume of ~1028 cubic centimeters. This fast rate of decay implies a sufficiently strong electric field to account for the particle acceleration that produces the microwave emission. The decrease in stored magnetic energy is enough to power the solar flare, including the associated eruption, particle acceleration, and plasma heating.

A radio frequency interference (RFI) excision algorithm based on spectral kurtosis, a spectral variant of time-domain kurtosis, is proposed and implemented in software. The algorithm works by providing a robust estimator for Gaussian noise that, when violated, indicates the presence of non-Gaussian RFI. A theoretical formalism is used that unifies the well-known time-domain kurtosis estimator with past work related to spectral kurtosis, and leads naturally to a single expression encompassing both. The algorithm accumulates the first two powers of M power spectral density (PSD) estimates, obtained via Fourier transform, to form a spectral kurtosis (SK) estimator whose expected statistical variance is used to define an RFI detection threshold. The performance of the algorithm is theoretically evaluated for different time-domain RFI characteristics and signal-to-noise ratios h. The theoretical performance of the algorithm for intermittent RFI (RFI present in R out of M PSD estimates) is evaluated and shown to depend greatly on the duty cycle, . The algorithm is most effective for d p R/M , but cannot distinguish RFI from Gaussian noise at any h when . The expected efficiency d p 1/(4 ϩ h) d p 0.5 and robustness of the algorithm are tested using data from the newly designed FASR Subsystem Testbed radio interferometer operating at the Owens Valley Solar Array. The ability of the algorithm to discriminate RFI against the temporally and spectrally complex radio emission produced during solar radio bursts is demonstrated.1 Throughout this paper, we use a "hat" notation to indicate an estimator of a quantity to distinguish it from the quantity itself.

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Many problems in solar physics require analysis of imaging data obtained in multiple wavelength domains with differing spatial resolution in a framework supplied by advanced three-dimensional (3D) physical models. To facilitate this goal, we have undertaken a major enhancement of our IDL-based simulation tools developed earlier for modeling microwave and X-ray emission. The enhanced software architecture allows the user to (1) import photospheric magnetic field maps and perform magnetic field extrapolations to generate 3D magnetic field models; (2) investigate the magnetic topology by interactively creating field lines and associated flux tubes; (3) populate the flux tubes with user-defined nonuniform thermal plasma and anisotropic, nonuniform, nonthermal electron distributions; (4) investigate the spatial and spectral properties of radio and X-ray emission calculated from the model; and (5) compare the model-derived images and spectra with observational data. The package integrates shared-object libraries containing fast gyrosynchrotron emission codes, IDL-based soft and hard X-ray codes, and potential and linear force-free field extrapolation routines. The package accepts user-defined radiation and magnetic field extrapolation plug-ins. We use this tool to analyze a relatively simple single-loop flare and use the model to constrain the magnetic 3D structure and spatial distribution of the fast electrons inside this loop. We iteratively compute multi-frequency microwave and multi-energy X-ray images from realistic magnetic flux tubes obtained from pre-flare extrapolations, and compare them with imaging data obtained by SDO, NoRH, and RHESSI. We use this event to illustrate the tool's use for the general interpretation of solar flares to address disparate problems in solar physics.

We report the observation of an unusual cold, tenuous solar flare, which reveals itself via numerous and prominent non-thermal manifestations, while lacking any noticeable thermal emission signature. RHESSI hard X-rays and 0.1-18 GHz radio data from OVSA and Phoenix-2 show copious electron acceleration (10 35 electrons per second above 10 keV) typical for GOES M-class flares with electrons energies up to 100 keV, but GOES temperatures not exceeding 6.1 MK. The imaging, temporal, and spectral characteristics of the flare have led us to a firm conclusion that the bulk of the microwave continuum emission from this flare was produced directly in the acceleration region. The implications of this finding for the flaring energy release and particle acceleration are discussed.

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