SEISMIC-SOUNDING OF THE SOLAR CORE - PURGING THE CORRUPTION FROM THE SUNS MAGNETIC ACTIVITY

Probing the structure and rotation of the solar core is one of the gre atest challenges to helioseismology. We show that the seismic informat ion in the observed low degree solar oscillations which probe the core is severely contaminated. This contamination arises from the Sun's ne ar surface magnetic activity. The effect on the oscillation frequencie s varies with the solar cycle-vanishing at solar minimum and growing w ith increasing surface activity. We demonstrate that this contaminatio n can be quantified and removed after determining the fine structure o f the entire oscillation spectrum.