Solar Activity and Irradiance Measurement
Direct irradiance measurements have only been available during the last three cycles and are based on a composite of many different observing satellites. However, the correlation between irradiance measurements and other proxies of solar activity make it reasonable to estimate past solar activity. Most important among these proxies is the record of sunspot observations that has been recorded since ~1610. Since sunspots and associated faculae are directly responsible for small changes in the brightness of the sun, they are closely correlated to changes in solar output. Direct measurements of radio emissions from the Sun at 10.7 cm also provide a proxy of solar activity that can be measured from the ground since the Earth's atmosphere is transparent at this wavelength. Lastly, solar flares are a type of solar activity that can impact human life on Earth by affecting electrical systems, especially satellites. Flares usually occur in the presence of sunspots, and hence the two are correlated, but flares themselves make only tiny perturbations of the solar luminosity.
Recently it has been claimed that the total solar irradiance is varying in ways that are not duplicated by changes in sunspot observations or radio emissions, though Willson, DeWitte, and others have pointed out that these shifts in irradiance may be no more than the result of calibration problems in the measuring satellites. These speculations also admit the possibility that a small long-term trend might exist in solar irradiance.
Read more about this topic: Solar Variation
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