Scientists began to analyze the first data transmitted to Earth by a probe that approached the star.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) have released unique photographs of the Sun's surface taken from the Solar Orbiter, the spacecraft of their joint mission.
This is what the Sun looks like from a distance of 77 million kilometers.
“We haven’t had any photographs of the Sun so close,” says Holly Gilbert of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, in charge of the scientific part of the solar project.
The Solar Orbiter, launched from Earth on February 9, 2020, photographed the Sun from a distance of 77 million kilometers. There he was on June 15, 2020 during the first approach with the luminary. The other day, the probe transmitted all the data collected then, including images, some of which scientists decided to show to the general public.
“We didn't expect to get such impressive results so quickly,” echoes NASA colleague Daniel Müller of ESA.
What impressed you most? Scientists saw what they had not previously guessed. In the pictures taken in the ultraviolet range, they made out miniature flares that now and then appeared on the surface of the star. Campfires - that's how they were called.
Mini-flashes or * pioneer bonfires * on the surface of the luminary.
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Scientists know that "bonfires" are millions of times weaker than ordinary solar flares. They have not yet clarified the nature of the phenomenon. However, it is not excluded that it is in the "fires" that the solution to one of the most "burning" solar secrets is hidden. Namely, the answer to the question why the outer atmosphere of the star is much hotter than its visible surface.
The temperature on the sun's surface barely exceeds 6 thousand degrees. Ky should decrease with distance from the star. But the temperature, on the contrary, is rising. Hundreds of times. The outer atmosphere of the Sun - the very corona - is heated up to a million degrees. This misunderstanding has been puzzling for over 60 years, since it was first discovered.
"Bonfires" of mini-flares may well contribute to abnormal heating. But this hypothesis has yet to be clarified, looking closely at the luminary during subsequent encounters, the minimum of which will be 42 million kilometers. It is expected that on approach, the polar regions of the Sun, inaccessible to observations from the Earth, will become visible.
Images of the Sun in different wavelength ranges.
The Solar Orbiter has delighted fans of the anomalous as well. They noticed something very strange in the sun: right in the middle of one of the pictures, you can see some kind of black ring that looks like a bead. The anomaly is located next to the "bonfires".
What is this ordered structure? A shooting defect or a reflection of certain processes taking place in the depths of the star? NASA has not yet clarified the essence. But it is unlikely that they will ever share the opinion of imaginative enthusiasts who call the bead ring an alien reconnaissance probe - like the Solar Orbiter, only much larger.
A snapshot from the Koltsrm - from among those released by NASA and ESA.
There is indeed another probe near the Sun, but our earthly one is Parker Solar Probe. He sends pictures from the atmosphere of the luminary to Earth and does not look like a ring at all.
Solar Orbiter and Parker Solar Probe may solve another solar mystery - the mystery of the solar wind. This hot stream of charged particles rushing from the Sun at a speed of several million kilometers per hour "washes" our entire system. The earth "feels" its bursts. And next to the Sun - at the surface - there is no wind. Why? It is not clear yet. Scientists will figure it out. Sami, no aliens.
