This thesis describes several studies of fundamental questions relating to the nature of coronal mass ejections (CMEs) and the solar magnetic field. First, a comparison is made between CMEs and the slow solar wind and it is found that the composition of both are very similar, with CMEs being a more extreme version of the same plasma. This result provides support for the theory that the slow solar wind originates on closed loops, in a smaller version of CME closed loops [Fisk and Schwadron, 2001b]. The slow solar wind plasma is released by intermittent reconnection processes in the solar corona, in strong contrast to models and theories that discuss the slow solar wind as a time-stationary, homogeneous plasma. These reconnection processes have important consequences for solar and heliospheric physics, some of which are explored in detail. As CME loops expand into the heliosphere they should consequently increase the magnetic flux in the heliosphere, without an apparent theoretical limit. We utilize a theory of open magnetic field line reconnection processes as described in Fisk and Schwadron [2001] to predict the rate at which CME field lines will reconnect and open into the heliosphere, with good agreement to the data. We further utilize these intermittent reconnection processes to describe a method by which two closed magnetic loops can reconnect with one another. We find that this reconnection provides enough energy to drive coronal loop heating. We finally discuss a very important practical aspect of CME research: there is no agreed upon set of in situ identifiers of CME plasma. The final study in this thesis investigates the relationships between new, state of the art, composition measurements and more traditional in situ CME signatures. It is found that no one single signature can be used to accurately identify all periods of CME ejecta. Rather, CME ejecta appears to consist of various individual signatures that come and go without a clear pattern as the CME passes the spacecraft. However, compositional signatures seem to be the most reliable in the sense that they almost always occur in conjunction with other, more traditional, identifiers.
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机译：本文描述了一些与日冕物质抛射（CME）和太阳磁场有关的基本问题的研究。首先，比较了CME和慢速太阳风，发现两者的成分非常相似，而CME是同一等离子的极端版本。这一结果为在较慢版本的CME闭环中慢太阳风起源于闭环的理论提供了支持[ Fisk and Schwadron ，2001b]。缓慢的太阳风等离子体是通过间歇性的重新连接过程在日冕中释放的，这与讨论将缓慢的太阳风作为时间平稳的均匀等离子体的模型和理论形成鲜明对比。这些重新连接过程对太阳和日圆物理具有重要的影响，其中一些将被详细探讨。随着CME回路扩展到日球层，它们应因此增加日球层中的磁通量，而没有明显的理论限制。我们利用Fisk和Schwadron [2001]中描述的开放磁场线重新连接过程的理论来预测CME磁场线重新连接并进入日光层的速率，与数据具有很好的一致性。我们进一步利用这些间歇性重新连接过程来描述一种方法，通过该方法，两个闭合磁环可以相互重新连接。我们发现，这种重新连接提供了足够的能量来驱动冠状循环加热。最后，我们讨论了CME研究的一个非常重要的实践方面：尚未达成共识的CME血浆原位标识符集。本论文的最终研究探讨了最新的技术水平，成分测量值与更传统的就地 CME签名之间的关系。发现没有一个单独的签名可用于准确识别CME射血的所有时期。恰恰相反，CME排出物似乎由各种个体特征组成，这些特征在CME通过航天器时来回走动，没有清晰的图案。但是，从它们几乎总是与其他更传统的标识符一起出现的意义上来说，组成签名似乎是最可靠的。
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