The Energy Spectrum of 20 keV - 20 MeV Electrons Accelerated in Large Solar Flares

Creators: Lin, R. P.; Mewaldt, R. A.; Van Hollebeke, M. A. I.

Abstract

IMP 6, 7, and 8 measurements of the energy spectrum of 20 keV to 20 MeV electrons observed from large solar flares are presented. To minimize propagation effects, only events from flares at W30° to W90° solar longitude are considered. The energy spectra are constructed using the maximum flux observed at each energy. It is shown that these spectra are representative of the spectra of the electrons escaping from the sun over this range of energies. It is found that every event shows the same spectral shape: a double power law with a smooth transition around 100-200 keV and power law exponents of 0.6-2.0 below and 2.4-4.3 above. The more intense the event, the harder the observed spectrum; in certain cases, the spectra are observed to steepen above 3 MeV.

Additional Information

© 1982 American Astronomical Society. Provided by the NASA Astrophysics Data System. We wish to thank F. B. McDonald and R. E. McGuire for providing information on the GSFC detector system. Berndt Iwers provided valuable assistance with the GSFC data analysis. One of us (R. A. M.) wishes to thank E. C. Stone for many fruitful discussions. The research at the University of California was supported in part by NASA grant NGL-05-003-017. The work at Caltech was supported in part by NASA under contract NAS 5-11066 and NAS 5-25789 and grant NGR-05-002-160. Space Radiation Laboratory SRL ID #: 1981-18.

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