The sun’s corona — its outer atmosphere — is usually impossible to see, since it’s far outshone by the rest of the sun. But during a total solar eclipse, the moon blocks out all but the vibrant, wispy corona. Getting a detailed image of the corona is tough; it’s constantly shifting. For this image, engineer Phil Hart used 5 main cameras, 4 refractors, 2 laptops, and plenty of digital image processing to capture some incredible details of the plasma and hot gases dancing along the sun’s magnetic field lines. You can learn about the awesome effort behind this image — and see more awesome photos from the eclipse — at his site. (Image credit: P. Hart; via APOD)
Tag: solar eclipse
Our Sun’s Corona Unfurled
This clever image is actually two solar eclipses stacked atop one another. The bottom half of the image shows the sun‘s corona — its wispy, dramatic outer atmosphere — during the a 2017 total solar eclipse, and top half shows a 2023 total solar eclipse. In both, the corona has been unwrapped from around the sun’s circumference and project instead into a rectangle.
The 2017 eclipse took place near the minimum of the sun’s solar cycle and appears relatively tranquil. The 2023 eclipse, in contrast, came near solar cycle’s maximum and shows a far more chaotic and turbulent environment. Notice the bright pink solar prominences dotting the mid-line and the field of shadowy plasma loops above them. (Image credit: P. Ward; via APOD)
Solar Eclipses and Coronal Mass Ejections
Observations of many solar phenomena have only become accessible to humans relatively recently with the advent of satellites. Prior to that, it simply wasn’t feasible to observe dynamics in the sun’s atmosphere, like solar prominences or coronal mass ejections – the sun was simply too bright to see them – except during the occasional total solar eclipse!
In the 1970s, scientists identified massive bursts of solar plasma as coronal mass ejections. These solar storms are responsible for so-called space weather and, when directed toward Earth, can pose a hazard to technologies on the ground and astronauts in orbit. Scientists initially thought this was the first time such storms had been observed, but they later recognized that photographs and sketches of an 1860 total eclipse revealed that humanity had seen a coronal mass ejection more than 100 years before! Check out the NASA video below for the full story. You can also learn about some of the science that will be going on in today’s eclipse. And, for those in the U.S. today, have a fun and safe time viewing the ecliipse! (Image credit: S. Habbal, M. Druckmüller and P. Aniol, source; video credit: NASA Goddard)
