On the Application of the Equal-contrast Technique to Ca-K Data from Kodaikanal and Other Observatories

Abstract

The "equal-contrast technique" (ECT) methodology, developed by Singh et al. to generate uniform long time series of Ca-K images obtained during the 20th century from the Kodaikanal Observatory (KO), improved the correlation between the plage area and sunspot parameters. The same methodology can also be used on other observatory data taken with different instruments. We can combine such ECT-corrected images to reduce the gaps in the observations and make a long uniform data set to study short- and long-term variations. We apply this procedure to Mount Wilson Observatory (MWO) historical Ca-K data and recent Ca-K filtergrams obtained using narrowband filters at KO and the Mauna Loa Solar Observatory (MLSO). To determine the success of this method, the results of the analysis of the ECT images obtained from KO, MWO, and MLSO are compared. A comparison of the plage and active areas derived from KO and MWO images before and after the ECT procedure indicates an improvement in the correlation coefficients (CCs) between all the data sets after the ECT application. The CC for the combined monthly mean Ca-K plage area derived from the KO, MWO, and Precision Solar Photometric Telescope (at the MLSO) data with sunspot numbers is 0.96 for the period 1905–2015. The paper demonstrates that the time series of Ca-K data obtained from different instruments after applying the ECT procedure becomes uniform in contrast. The combined time series of KO and MWO spectroheliograms has 12 hr intervals compared to the ≈24 hr gap for a time series from a single observatory.