The standard solar model was so reliable that it could predict the existence of the massive neutrino. Helioseismology measurements were so precise that they could determine the depth of the convection zone. This agreement between theory and observation was the envy of all astrophysics -until recently when sophisticated three-dimensional hydrodynamic calculations of the solar atmosphere reduced the metal content by a factor of almost two. Antia & Basu (2005) suggested that a higher value of the solar neon abundance, A N e /A O = 0.52, would resolve this controversy. Drake & Testa (2005) presented strong evidence in favor of this idea from a sample of 21 Chandra stars with enhanced values of the neon abundance, A N e /A O = 0.41. In this paper, we have analyzed solar active region spectra from the archive of the Flat Crystal Spectrometer on Solar Maximum Mission, a NASA mission from the 1980s, as well as full-Sun spectra from the pioneering days of X-ray astronomy in the 1960s. These data seem consistent with the standard neon-to-oxygen abundance value, A N e /A O = 0.15 (Grevesse & Sauval 1998). If these results prove to be correct, than the enhanced-neon hypothesis will not resolve the current controversy.

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We present our preliminary findings as part of a coronal condensations and bright spots, are common new data mining application aiming at the automatic detection around the time of solar maximum (the sun goes through of images with coronal loops from one of NASA's solar image a cycle of activity every 11 years), while larger faint databases, known as EIT. Coronal loops are immense arches of hot gas on the surface of the Sun, thought to be jets of hot onest last d solr weeks a ty pical o e plasma flowing along in the alleys between the strong coronal quiet corona, when solar activity is low. The two ends magnetic fields. We use various data mining techniques including of a loop, known as footprints, lie in regions of the combining crisp and fuzzy classifiers for automated detection of photosphere of opposite magnetic polarity to each other. blocks extracted from EIT solar images. Our data mining and Coronal loops have been linked to complex phenomena retrieval system helps provide relevant data to astrophysicists who need such data to study the solar corona, and whose work onates sn, such asvolent corona mas rejtions, solar is traditionally hindered by the need to manually sift through flares, and solar storms, that affect the rest of the solar thousands of images in order to locate the very few that are useful system, by shaking the Earth's magnetic field and power for further analysis. Our data-driven approach is distinct from grids, and possibly harming satellites and astronomers related image processing based approaches that cannot scale to in space. Measurements of the temperature distribution large image databases because they rely mostly on semi-automated along the loop length can be used to support or eliminate detection and on heavy and computationally intensive local shape analysis.'234 various classes of coronal temperature models [7]. In order to make progress, scientific analysis requires data observed by instruments such as EIT, TRACE, and I. INTRODUCTION SXT [7]. The combination of EIT, TRACE, and SXT The Coronal Heating Problem [8,9] is one of the information provides a powerful data set that will yield longest standing unsolved mysteries in astrophysics, and unprecedented detail on the plasma parameters of a is essentially concerned with understanding and model-variety of coronal loop structures. The biggest obstacle ing the exact properties of temperature distribution along to completing studies of the solar loop properties has coronal loops. The corona is the uppermost level of the been putting the data set together, so that the subseSun's (or another star's) atmosphere, lying immediately quent scientific analysis is performed. The search for above its visible surface. Coronal loops (see Figure 1) interesting images (the ones with coronal loops) is by far are immense arches of hot gas on the surface of the the most time consuming aspect of this scientific task, Sun, thought to be jets of hot plasma flowing along in amounting to a "search for a needle in a haystack". In the alleys between the st...

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