The flip coincides with a peak in solar activity. "Solarmaxiumum as it is known, is when the Sun is feverish with activity. There are more sunspots, which are concentrated regions of magnetic fieldbubbling up on the surface, and many more solar eruptions likesolar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs), which are caused bythe magnetic field loops bursting up out of the surface, and thenbreaking, releasing huge amounts of energy -- when CMEs aredirected towards Earth they can disruptsatellites and power grids. "
At solar maximum, the magnetic field is just a big mess, saysEastwood. "Exactly how [it] reverses is still not well understood[but] what we can see is that the magnetic field becomes much morecomplicated". Instead of a simple bar magnet structure, with a top and bottom,the magnetic field structure becomes more octopus-like, with manymagnetic poles, instead of just two. During this noisy phase, the hemispheres do not change polaritynecessarily at the same rate. |