Characteristics of Four SPE Classes According to Onset Timing and Proton Acceleration Patterns

In our previous work (Kim et al., 2015), we suggested a new classification scheme, which categorizes the SPEs into four groups based on association with flare or CME inferred from onset timings as well as proton acceleration patterns using multienergy observations. In this study, we have tried to find whether there are any typical characteristics of associated events and acceleration sites in each group using 42 SPEs from 1997 to 2012. We find: (i) if the proton acceleration starts from a lower energy, a SPE has a higher chance to be a strong event (>5000pfu) even if the associated flare and CME are not so strong. The only difference between the SPEs associated with flare and CME is the location of the acceleration site. For the former, the sites are very low (~1Rs) and close to the western limb, while the latter has a relatively higher and wider acceleration sites. (ii) When the proton acceleration starts from the higher energy, a SPE tends to be a relatively weak event (<1000pfu), in spite of its associated CME is relatively stronger than previous group. (iii) The SPEs categorized by the simultaneous proton acceleration in whole energy range within 10 minutes, tend to show the weakest proton flux in spite of strong related eruptions. Their acceleration heights are very close to the locations of type II radio bursts. Based on those results, we suggest that the different characteristics of the four groups are mainly due to the different mechanisms governing the acceleration pattern and interval, and different condition such as the acceleration location.