Paper detail

Standing kink waves in sigmoid solar coronal loops: implications for coronal seismology

Using full three-dimensional magnetohydrodynamic numerical simulations, we study the effects of magnetic field sigmoidity or helicity on the properties of the fundamental kink oscillation of solar coronal loops. Our model consists of a single denser coronal loop, embedded in a plasma with dipolar force-free magnetic field with a constant alpha-parameter. For the loop with no sigmoidity, we find that the numerically determined oscillation period of the fundamental kink mode matches the theoretical period calculated using WKB theory. In contrast, with increasing sigmoidity of the loop, the actual period is increasingly smaller than the one estimated by WKB theory. Translated through coronal seismology, increasing sigmoidity results in magnetic field estimates which are increasingly shifting towards higher values, and even surpassing the average value for the highest alpha value considered. Nevertheless, the estimated range of the coronal magnetic field value lies within the mimimal/maximal limits, proving the robustness coronal seismology. We propose that the discrepancy in the estimations of the absolute value of the force-free magnetic field could be exploited seismologically to determine the free energy of coronal loops, if averages of the internal magnetic field and density can be reliably estimated by other methods.