All articles tagged with #solar physics
Astronomers set a new record by continuously observing the Sun's active region NOAA 13664 for over 90 days using two spacecraft, providing valuable insights into solar activity and improving space weather predictions.
Scientists used the Solar Orbiter to observe the active solar region NOAA 13664 for 94 days, the longest ever recorded, which helped link a major geomagnetic storm in May 2024 to solar activity, providing new insights into solar behavior and its impact on Earth.
A groundbreaking collaboration between the ground-based DKIST telescope and the space-based Solar Orbiter has provided new insights into the Sun's activity, including the discovery of tiny structures called 'campfires' and detailed observations of the Sun's magnetic fields, advancing our understanding of solar phenomena and their impact on Earth.
The sun is technically classified as a G2V main-sequence star, often called a dwarf star, but it is much larger than what is typically considered a dwarf star. It is a yellow, hydrogen-fusing star that will eventually become a red giant in about 5 billion years. Despite its name, the sun appears yellow due to atmospheric scattering, and it is the largest object in our solar system.
Scientists have discovered hundreds of mysterious missing wavelengths in the Sun's spectrum that remain unexplained despite over 200 years of study, highlighting gaps in current atomic data and the complex, dynamic nature of the Sun's atmosphere.
SOHO has been observing the Sun for 30 years, providing invaluable data that has revolutionized our understanding of solar phenomena, contributed to space weather forecasting, and supported numerous scientific discoveries and subsequent missions.
Scientists have finally observed small-scale torsional Alfvén waves across the Sun's corona, providing crucial evidence for understanding how the corona reaches millions of degrees Celsius and how solar winds are generated, which can improve space weather forecasting.
New observations from the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope suggest that Alfvén waves, magnetic waves traveling through the sun's corona, carry significant energy that may explain the long-standing mystery of why the sun's outer atmosphere is much hotter than its surface, potentially accounting for at least half of the heating required.
Researchers at the University of Hawai'i have discovered that the mysterious rain on the Sun, composed of superheated plasma, is influenced by shifting flows of elements like iron, silicon, and magnesium in the Sun's corona. This finding helps explain the rapid formation of coronal rain and suggests new insights into solar atmospheric dynamics and coronal heating. The study challenges previous models assuming constant elemental distribution and opens avenues for further research into solar phenomena.
New research suggests that ions in solar flares may reach temperatures up to 60 million Kelvin, far hotter than previously thought, due to more effective heating mechanisms that favor ions over electrons, potentially altering our understanding of solar flare dynamics.
New research suggests that particles in solar flares are 6.5 times hotter than previously believed, with ions reaching over 60 million degrees, potentially solving a long-standing mystery about flare spectral line widths and indicating a paradigm shift in understanding solar flare heating mechanisms.
The NSF Inouye Solar Telescope captured its first X-class solar flare in unprecedented detail, revealing structures like tiny coronal loops at scales as small as 21 kilometers, providing new insights into the Sun's most energetic eruptions and magnetic reconnection processes.
Scientists captured the most detailed images of a solar flare ever using the Inouye Solar Telescope, revealing plasma loops as small as 13 miles across, which could enhance understanding of solar flare mechanics and magnetic reconnection.
The Inouye Solar Telescope captured the highest-resolution images of a solar flare, revealing ultra-fine coronal loops as small as 21 km, potentially revolutionizing our understanding of solar magnetic structures and flare mechanisms.
NASA's Parker Solar Probe has confirmed decades-old models of magnetic reconnection in the solar atmosphere, providing new insights into how solar flares and coronal mass ejections occur, which can impact Earth's technology and space weather predictions.