Supergranulation is a fluid-dynamical phenomenon taking place in the solar photosphere, primarily detected in the form of a vigorous cellular flow pattern with a typical horizontal scale of approximately 30–35 Mm, a dynamical evolution time of 24–48 h, a strong 300–400 m/s (rms) horizontal flow component and a much weaker 20–30 m/s vertical component. Supergranulation was discovered more than 60 years ago, however, explaining its physical origin and most important observational characteristics has proven extremely challenging ever since, as a result of the intrinsic multiscale, nonlinear dynamical complexity of the problem concurring with strong observational and computational limitations. Key progress on this problem is now taking place with the advent of twenty-first-century supercomputing resources and the availability of global observations of the dynamics of the solar surface with high spatial and temporal resolutions. This article provides an exhaustive review of observational, numerical and theoretical research on supergranulation, and discusses the current status of our understanding of its origin and dynamics, most importantly in terms of large-scale nonlinear thermal convection, in the light of a selection of recent findings.

超粒化是发生在太阳光球层的一种流体动力学现象，主要以活跃的细胞流模式的形式检测到，典型的水平尺度约为 30-35 Mm，动态演化时间为 24-48 小时，强 300 –400 m/s (rms) 水平流分量和弱得多的 20-30 m/s 垂直流分量。然而，超粒化现象在 60 多年前就被发现了，然而，从那时起，解释其物理起源和最重要的观测特征就被证明极具挑战性，因为该问题具有内在的多尺度、非线性动力学复杂性，同时存在强烈的观测和计算限制。随着二十一世纪超级计算资源的出现以及对太阳表面动态的高空间和时间分辨率的全球观测的可用性，这个问题正在取得关键进展。本文对超粒化的观测、数值和理论研究进行了详尽的回顾，并根据最近的一些研究，讨论了我们对其起源和动力学的理解现状，最重要的是在大规模非线性热对流方面。发现。