Monday, October 13, 2008

The Sun as You Have Never Seen it Before

This week’s Boston Globe’s Big Pictures features the Sun

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This animation shows the Sun over the course of six days starting June 25, 2007. You can clearly see the rotation and some flares and prominences. Animations like this really drive home the point that the Sun is a dynamic body and not just the constatnt light we see with out eyes.

Be sure to check out the rest of the Big Picture: The Sun.

Reprinted with permission from the Half-Astrophysicist Blog.

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11 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 13, 2008 at 4:56 PM

    Of all the stupid things...I didn't know the sun rotated? WOW I thought it just hung around all day. Great shot.

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  2. drewzepmeisterOctober 13, 2008 at 5:39 PM

    Magnificent pictures,Hale!! I just love those space blogs-always learning something from them.

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  3. OrbsCorbsOctober 13, 2008 at 7:10 PM

    I put up the sun gif on another site and linked to the article. Great pics.

    I saw a special on the sun on the History Channel, so now I'm an expert.

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  4. MinnesotaChickOctober 13, 2008 at 8:06 PM

    Very H O T!!! :)

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  5. LizardmomOctober 13, 2008 at 8:31 PM

    awesome picture Hale!

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  6. kkditherOctober 13, 2008 at 9:05 PM

    Very cool. So clear it doesn't even look real.

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  7. hale-boppOctober 13, 2008 at 10:45 PM

    kk, the image was taken from the SOHO satellite. SOHO is orbiting at the first LaGrange point about a million miles closer to the Sun than the Earth.

    Not only does the Sun rotate, it has differential rotation. It takes a point on the equator about 25 days to go around once and about 36 days at the poles. This differential rotation leads to all kinds of twisted and tangled magnetic fields and I don't want anything to do with the mathematics behind them (that math would keep me from drunk emailing!)

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  8. kkditherOctober 14, 2008 at 7:22 AM

    Differential rotation? That is my "learn a new thing each day" thing. Wow. That is crazy. Is this only possible because the sun is a gas?

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  9. hale-boppOctober 14, 2008 at 4:22 PM

    You got it, kk. Jupiter and Saturn have similar behavior (although not quite as pronounced).

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  10. kkditherOctober 14, 2008 at 4:34 PM

    So next time I get "gassed," I can explain my irregular behavior on differential rotation and tangled magnetic fields? Cool... ;D

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  11. hale-boppOctober 15, 2008 at 12:46 AM

    Okay, I think we are going to have to degauss you before the next JTI gathering!

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