High-Resolution Observations of a Flux Rope with the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph

Abstract

We report the observations of a flux rope at transition region temperatures with the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) on 30 August 2014. Initially, magnetic flux cancellation continually took place and a filament was activated. Then the bright material from the filament moved southward and tracked out several fine structures. These fine structures were twisted and tangled with each other, and appeared as a small flux rope at 1330 Å, with a total twist of about 4 π . Afterwards, the flux rope underwent a counterclockwise (viewed top-down) unwinding motion around its axis. Spectral observations of C II 1335.71 Å at the southern leg of the flux rope revealed Doppler redshifts of 6 -24 kms−¹ at the western side of the axis, which is consistent with the counterclockwise rotation motion. We suggest that the magnetic flux cancellation initiates reconnection and activation of the flux rope. The stored twist and magnetic helicity of the flux rope are transported into the upper atmosphere by the unwinding motion in the late stage. The small-scale flux rope (width of 8.3^″) had a cylindrical shape with helical field lines, similar to the morphology of the large-scale CME core (width of 1.54 R_⊙) on 2 June 1998. This similarity shows the presence of flux ropes of different scales on the Sun.