Prediction of even and odd sunspot cycles

Abstract

Here we study the prediction of even and odd numbered sunspot cycles separately, thereby taking into account the Hale cyclicity of solar magnetism. We first show that the temporal evolution and shape of all sunspot cycles are extremely well described by a simple parameterized mathematical expression. We find that the parameters describing even sunspot cycles can be predicted quite accurately using the sunspot number 41 months prior to sunspot minimum as a precursor. We find that the parameters of the odd cycles can be best predicted with geomagnetic maximum geomagnetic aa index close to fall equinox within a 3-year window preceding the sunspot minimum. We use the found precursors to hindcast all previous sunspot cycles and evaluate the performance with a cross-validation methodology, which indicates that each past cycle is very accurately predicted. For the coming sunspot cycle 25 we predict an amplitude of 171 ± 23 and the end of the cycle in September 2029 ± 1.9 years. We are also able to make a rough prediction for cycle 26 based on the predicted cycle 25. While the uncertainty for the cycle amplitude is large we estimate that the cycle 26 will most likely be stronger than cycle 25. These results suggest an increasing trend in solar activity for the next decades.