Update on g-mode research

Since the beginning of this century we have attended a blooming of the gravity-mode research thanks to the unprecedented quality of the data available, either from space with SoHO, or from the ground-based networks as BiSON or GONG. From the first upper limit of the gravity-mode amplitudes fixed at 10 mm/s at 200 mu Hz given by Appourchaux et al. (2000), on one hand, a peak was supposed to be a component of the l = 1, n = 1 mixed mode (Garcia et al. 2001a, 2001b; Gabriel et al. 2002) and, on the other hand, a couple of patterns - multiplets - were attributed to gravity modes (Turck-Chieze et al. 2004; Mathur et al. 2007). One of these patterns, found around 220 mu Hz, could be labeled as the l = 2, n = -3 g mode, which is expected to be the one with the highest surface amplitude (Cox & Guzik 2004). Finally, in 2007, Garcia et al. were able to measure the fingertips of the dipole gravity modes looking for their asymptotic properties. In the present paper we present an update of the recent developments on this subject with special attention to the 220 mu Hz region, the dipole asymptotic properties and the impact of the incoming g-mode observations on the knowledge of the solar structure and rotation profile. (C) 2008 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.