Solar flares, coronal mass ejections, and indeed phenomena on all scales observed on the Sun, are inextricably linked with the Sun's magnetic field. The solar surface is covered with magnetic features observed on many spatial scales, which evolve on differing timescales: the largest features, sunspots, follow an 11-year cycle; the smallest seem to follow no cycle. Here, we analyze magnetograms from Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO)/Michelson Doppler Imager (full disk and high resolution) and Hinode/Solar Optical Telescope to determine the fluxes of all currently observable surface magnetic features. We show that by using a "clumping" algorithm, which counts a single "flux massif" as one feature, all feature fluxes, regardless of flux strength, follow the same distribution-a power law with slope −1.85 ± 0.14-between 2 × 10 17 and 10 23 Mx. A power law suggests that the mechanisms creating surface magnetic features are scale-free. This implies that either all surface magnetic features are generated by the same mechanism, or that they are dominated by surface processes (such as fragmentation, coalescence, and cancellation) in a way which leads to a scale-free distribution.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.