Expansion of the supergranular magnetic network through the solar atmosphere

The solar magnetic field has its footpoints in the photosphere, extends through the chromosphere, and is thought to expand through the transition region and into the corona. It is organized by fluid motions to form strong flux concentrations within the boundaries of the supergranular convection cells. These boundaries are the network lanes observed in line emission, and they display increasing width with height through the solar atmosphere. The network field concentrations are surrounded by a mixed-polarity internetwork magnetic field on the scale of granulation. We use a potential magnetic field extrapolation of synthetic photospheric magnetograms to study the magnetic network topology and the effects of a mixed-polarity background field on the network expansion with height through the solar atmosphere. We find that the expansion of the network boundary with height deviates significantly from the funnel expansion model. Moreover, we find that the background magnetic field has a considerable effect on the filling factor of the network area with height, even though the background flux is strictly equal to zero.