A COMBINED STUDY OF PHOTOSPHERIC MAGNETIC AND CURRENT HELICITIES AND SUBSURFACE KINETIC HELICITIES OF SOLAR ACTIVE REGIONS DURING 2006-2013

We compare the average photospheric current helicity H{sub c} , photospheric twist parameter α (a well-known proxy for the full relative magnetic helicity), and subsurface kinetic helicity H{sub k} for 194 active regions observed between 2006-2013. We use 2440 Hinode photospheric vector magnetograms, and the corresponding subsurface fluid velocity data derived from GONG (2006-2012) and Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager (2010-2013) dopplergrams. We find a significant hemispheric bias in all three parameters. The subsurface kinetic helicity is preferentially positive in the southern hemisphere and negative in the northern hemisphere. The photospheric current helicity and the α parameter have the same bias for strong fields (|B| > 1000 G) and no significant bias for weak fields (100 G <|B| < 500 G). We find no significant region-by-region correlation between the subsurface kinetic helicity and either the strong-field current helicity or α. Subsurface fluid motions of a given handedness correspond to photospheric helicities of both signs in approximately equal numbers. However, common variations appear in annual averages of these quantities over all regions. Furthermore, in a subset of 77 regions, we find significant correlations between the temporal profiles of the subsurface and photospheric helicities. In these cases, the sign of the linear correlationmore » coefficient matches the sign relationship between the helicities, indicating that the photospheric magnetic field twist is sensitive to the twisting motions below the surface.« less