NUMERICAL-SIMULATION OF THE STATIONARY STATE OF PERIODICALLY DRIVEN CORONAL LOOPS

The heating of solar coronal loops by resonant absorption of Alfvén waves is studied in the framework of linearized, compressible, resistive MHD by means of numerical simulations in which the loops are approximated by straight cylindrical, axisymmetric plasma columns with equilibrium quantities varying only in the radial direction. The incident waves that excite the loops are modelled by a periodic external source. The stationary state of this driven system is determined numerically with a finite element code. The finite element technique is extremely suitable to compute the nearly-singular solutions and yields very accurate results. The efficiency of the heating mechanism and the energy deposition profile in this stationary state strongly depend on the characteristics of both the external driver and the equilibrium. A numerical survey of the relevant parameter space shows that resonant absorption is very efficient for typical coronal parameter values and appears to be a viable candidate heating mechanism for solar loops. © 1990.