Unprecedented Sun Photos Uncover Origins of ‘Space Weather Threat’

New images reveal the sun in never-before-seen detail after a record-breaking probe flyby late last year.

The photos, snapped an impressive 6.1 million kilometers away from the sun’s surface, reveal characteristics in the solar wind, which is a perpetual flow of electrically charged subatomic particles emitted by the sun that surge through the solar system at speeds over 1.6 million kilometers per hour.

These visuals, along with other data, aid scientists in unraveling the enigmas of the solar wind, which is crucial for comprehending its impact on Earth.

It took the new images while passing through the sun’s outer atmosphere, the corona.

Why are solar winds important?

Solar winds can wreak potential havoc on planetary bodies, including Earth.

They can help generate auroras, strip atmospheres, and overwhelm power grids and electronic communications on Earth.

The new images give scientists a closer look at what happens to the solar wind shortly after it is released from the corona.

Additionally, they recorded the interaction of several coronal mass ejections, or CMEs—significant eruptions of charged particles that predominantly influence space weather—captured in high resolution for the first time.

“In these images, we’re seeing the CMEs basically piling up on top of one another,” Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory WISPR instrument scientist Angelos Vourlidas said.

“We’re using this to figure out how the CMEs merge together, which can be important for space weather.”