Following the success of the first mission, the High-Resolution Coronal Imager (Hi-C) was launched for a third time (Hi-C 2.1) on 29 th May 2018 from the White Sands Missile Range, NM, USA. On this occasion, 329 seconds of 17.2 nm data of target active region AR 12712 was captured with a cadence of ≈ 4 s, and a plate scale of 0.129 pixel. Using data captured by Hi-C 2.1 and co-aligned observations from SDO/AIA 17.1 nm we investigate the widths of 49 coronal strands. We search for evidence of substructure within the strands that is not detected by AIA, and further consider whether these strands are fully resolved by Hi-C 2.1. With the aid of Multi-Scale Gaussian Normalization (MGN), strands from a region of low-emission that can only be visualized against the contrast of the darker, underlying moss are studied. A comparison is made between these low-emission strands with those from regions of higher emission within the target active region. It is found that Hi-C 2.1 can resolve individual strands as small as ≈ 202 km, though more typical strands widths seen are ≈ 513 km. For coronal strands within the region of low-emission, the most likely width is significantly narrower than the high-emission strands at ≈ 388 km. This places the low-emission coronal strands beneath the resolving capabilities of SDO/AIA, highlighting the need of a permanent solar observatory with the resolving power of Hi-C.

Previous work utilizing NASA's High-resolution Coronal Imager (Hi-C 2.1) 172 Å observations revealed that, even at the increased spatial scales available in the dataset, there may be evidence for coronal structures that are still not fully resolved. In this follow-up study, cross-section slices of coronal strands are taken across the Hi-C 2.1 field of view. Following previous loop-width studies, the background emission is removed to isolate the coronal strands. The resulting intensity variations are reproduced by simultaneously fitting multiple Gaussian profiles using a nonlinear least-squares curve-fitting method. In total, 183 Gaussian profiles are examined for possible structures that are hinted at in the data. The full width at half maximum is determined for each Gaussian, which are then collated and analyzed. The most frequent structural widths are ≈450-575 km with 47% of the strand widths beneath NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) resolving scale (600-1000 km). Only 17% reside beneath an AIA pixel width (435 km) with just 6% of the strands at the Hi-C 2.1 resolving scale (≈220-340 km). These results suggest that non-Gaussian shaped cross-sectional emission profiles observed by Hi-C 2.1 are the result of multiple strands along the integrated line of sight that can be resolved, rather than being the result of even finer sub-resolution elements.

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The interaction of siphon flow with an initially linear Alfvén wave within an isolated chromospheric loop is investigated. The loop is modeled using 1.5D magnetohydrodynamics (MHD). The siphon flow undergoes a hydrodynamic (HD) shock, which allows the Alfvén instability to amplify the propagating waves as they interact with the shock and loop footpoints. The amplification leads to nonlinear processes strongly altering the loop equilibrium. Azimuthal twists of are generated and the loop becomes globally twisted with an azimuthal magnetic field of . The flow is accelerated to due to the propagating shock waves that form. Near the end of the simulation, where the nonlinear processes are strongest, flow reversal is seen within the descending leg of the loop, generating upflows up to . This flow reversal leads to photospheric material being “pulled” into the loop and spreading along its entirety. Within about 2.5 hr, the density increases by a factor of about 30 its original value.