Cycle 24 Flares Begin
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Introduction
The Nuggets have been watching the current solar cycle as it begins (see Nuggets [A], [B], [C], [D], [E]); the amazing thing about these Nuggets is that they began in December 2008, when we already were baffled by the lengthy [sunspot] minimum period. It has taken almost two years now for us to reach a level of activity where we might have a major flare, as described below, but not yet.
It has been amazingly slow to set in, but we are beginning to get scientific results on flares from the new cycle. We discuss one of them in this Nugget, and another in the next Nugget.
The Spots Return!
Solar physicists interested in flares are eagerly awaiting the powerful ones of this cycle, since there is amazingly good new observational capability such as the powerful SDO satellite. Success here is measured in flares of [GOES X] category, none of which have yet occurred. We have had 7 M-class flares (a factor of ten weaker) since SDO "first light", and we will discuss one of the more interesting ones in the next section. Meanwhile, Figure 1 shows that indeed the areas of [sunspots] are steadily increasing, as expected even if a couple of years late.
