SolO/EUI Observations of Ubiquitous Fine-scale Bright Dots in an Emerging Flux Region: Comparison with a Bifrost MHD Simulation

Abstract

We report on the presence of numerous tiny bright dots in and around an emerging flux region (an X-ray/coronal bright point) observed with SolO's EUI/HRI_EUV in 174 Å. These dots are roundish and have a diameter of 675 ± 300 km, a lifetime of 50 ± 35 s, and an intensity enhancement of 30% ± 10% above their immediate surroundings. About half of the dots remain isolated during their evolution and move randomly and slowly (<10 km s^-1). The other half show extensions, appearing as a small loop or surge/jet, with intensity propagations below 30 km s^-1. Many of the bigger and brighter HRI_EUV dots are discernible in the SDO/AIA 171 Å channel, have significant emissivity in the temperature range of 1-2 MK, and are often located at polarity inversion lines observed in SDO/HMI LOS magnetograms. Although not as pervasive as in observations, a Bifrost MHD simulation of an emerging flux region does show dots in synthetic Fe IX/X images. These dots in the simulation show distinct Doppler signatures-blueshifts and redshifts coexist, or a redshift of the order of 10 km s^-1 is followed by a blueshift of similar or higher magnitude. The synthetic images of O V/VI and Si IV lines, which represent transition region radiation, also show the dots that are observed in Fe IX/X images, often expanded in size, or extended as a loop, and always with stronger Doppler velocities (up to 100 km s^-1) than that in Fe IX/X lines. Our observation and simulation results, together with the field geometry of dots in the simulation, suggest that most dots in emerging flux regions form in the lower solar atmosphere (at ≈ 1 Mm) by magnetic reconnection between emerging and preexisting/emerged magnetic field. Some dots might be manifestations of magnetoacoustic shocks through the line formation region of Fe IX/X emission.