Posts Tagged sun

Our Strange Sky: Alan Friedman Captures a Floater Above the Sun

Posted by mistergroonk in Photography, Science, Space on March 11, 2011

Phil Plait, aka The Bad Astronomer, had this to say:

This picture was taken by Alan Friedman…

Alan used a filter that lets through only a very narrow wavelength of light emitted by hydrogen (called HÎ± for those of you keeping track at home), so this tracks the activity of gas on the solar surface. He also inverts the image of the solar disk (makes it a negative) to increase contrast. Somehow this adds a three-dimensional quality to the picture, and reveals an amazing amount of texture. I swear I had a rug in my bedroom growing up that was this texture (though somewhat cooler and less burny).

The scene-stealer is that detached prominence off to the left. Thatâ€™s the leftover material ejected from the Sun by an erupting sunspot (you can see other sunspots in the picture as well). The gas is ionized â€” a plasma â€” and so itâ€™s affected by magnetic fields. The material follows the magnetic field of the Sun in the explosion, lifting it off the surface and into space. Sometimes it falls back, and sometimes it leaves the Sun entirely. In this case, Alan caught some of the material at what looks like the top of its trajectory.

Here’s another bit of science that will blow your mind. The mass of the prominence in this picture “can easily top 10 billion tons“!

via nerdist, bad astronomer, alan friedman

Alan Friedman, awesome, bad astronomer, live for science die for science, nicely, phil plait, solar prominence, sun, sunspots

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Wherein Our Local Heavenly Bodies Observe a Recession

Posted by mistergroonk in Space on April 3, 2009

It has come to our attention that the Solar System is tightening its wallet. Our sun is in a Deep Solar Minimum and Jupiter’s Red Spot is not as stormy as it used to be.

The Jovian Eye Looking Smaller Year by Year

The spot, which is actually an ancient monster storm that measures about three Earths across, lost 15 percent of its diameter between 1996 and 2006, scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, have found.

It shrank by about 1 kilometer (about 0.6 miles) a day during that time period, said Xylar Asay-Davis, a postdoctoral researcher who was part of the study.

[…]
Astronomers see a dramatic difference in the spot’s shape when comparing photos of Jupiter taken more than a century ago to recent images of the planet. Orton joked that the Great Red Spot used to be so long that its acronym should have stood for the “Great Red Sausage.”

“I just happened to look at an old picture and said to myself, ‘That looks like a breakfast sausage.’ It’s very long. I mean, if you look at one of those pictures back from then and a picture now, you think, ‘My God, this thing is going on a diet,” Orton said.

Now eye-shaped, the spot is expected to become circular by about 2040, he added.

Thanks for making us hungry, astronomer Orton. You’ve blown our breakfast diet for at least a month. How would you like it if we came to your workplace and spoke all day of the pizza rings of Saturn or the oceans of Dr Pepper that lurk just under the surface of Mars.

Also, Faithful Readers, we do not suggest plugging “great red sausage” into your Google search machines at work. Trust us on this.

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jupiter, red spot, sun, sunspots

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