Global Effects of Local Sound-Speed Perturbations in the Sun: A Theoretical Study

Abstract

We study the effect of localized sound-speed perturbations on global mode frequencies by applying techniques of global helioseismology to numerical simulations of the solar acoustic wave field. Extending the method of realization-noise subtraction (e.g., Hanasoge, Duvall, and Couvidat, Astrophys. J.664, 1234, 2007) to global modes and exploiting the luxury of full spherical coverage, we are able to achieve very highly resolved frequency differences that are then used to study sensitivities and the signatures of the thermal asphericities. We find that i) global modes are almost twice as sensitive to sound-speed perturbations at the bottom of the convection zone in comparison to anomalies well inside the radiative interior (r≲0.55R_⊙), ii) the m degeneracy is lifted ever so slightly, as seen in the a coefficients, and iii) modes that propagate in the vicinity of the perturbations show small amplitude shifts. Through comparisons with error estimates obtained from Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI; Scherrer et al., Solar Phys.162, 129, 1995) observations, we find that the frequency differences are detectable with a sufficiently long time series (70 - 642 days).