The existence of hot X-ray onsets in solar flares

Context. It is well known among the scientific community that solar flare activity often begins well before the main impulsive energy release. However, a consistent explanation for this phenomenon has not yet been established.Aims. Our aim is to investigate the earliest phase of four distinct flares observed by Solar Orbiter/STIX and determine the relationships of the newly heated plasma to flare structure and dynamics.Methods. The analysis focuses on four events that were observed from both Earth and Solar Orbiter, which allows for a comparison of STIX observations with those of GOES/XRS and SDO/AIA. The early phases of the events were studied using STIX and GOES spectroscopic analysis to investigate the evolution of the physical parameters of the plasma, including the isothermal temperature and emission measure. Furthermore, to determine the location of the heated plasma, STIX observations were combined with AIA images.Results. The events with clear emission prior to the impulsive phase show elevated temperatures (> 10 MK) from the very beginning, which indicates that energy release started before any detection by STIX. Although the temperature shows little variation during the initial phase, the emission measure increases by about two orders of magnitude, implying a series of incrementally greater energy releases. The spectral analysis of STIX and GOES from the very first time bins suggests that the emission has a multi-thermal nature, with a hot component of more than 10 MK. Alternative heating mechanisms may be more significant during this phase, since nonthermal emission, as observed by STIX, is only detected later. STIX and AIA images reveal the presence of more compact sources of hot plasma early in the flare that originate from different locations with respect to the standard loop-top source that is observed later in the flare. However, because extended bremsstrahlung sources are much more difficult to detect than compact sources, there might be additionally heated plasma in the loop-top during hot onsets.Conclusions. This analysis confirms the existence of "hot onsets", with STIX detecting the hot onset pattern even earlier than GOES. These elevated temperatures imply that energy release actually begins well before any detection by STIX. Therefore, hot onsets may be significant in the initiation, early development, or even prediction of solar flares.