Latest news with #corona
The Standard
16-07-2025
- Science
- The Standard
Skimming the Sun, probe sheds light on space weather threats
This photo provided by NASA on July 15, 2025 taken by Parker Solar Probe's WISPR instrument during its record-breaking flyby of the Sun on December 25, 2024, shows the solar wind racing out from the Sun's outer atmosphere, the corona. (Photo by Handout / NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Naval Research Lab / AFP)
Forbes
08-07-2025
- Science
- Forbes
Total Solar Eclipses May Soon Last 48 Minutes, Scientists Say
A total solar eclipse is seen on Monday, August 21, 2017 above Madras, Oregon. A total solar eclipse ... More swept across a narrow portion of the contiguous United States from Lincoln Beach, Oregon to Charleston, South Carolina. A partial solar eclipse was visible across the entire North American continent along with parts of South America, Africa, and Europe. Photo Credit: (NASA/Aubrey Gemignani) NASA/Aubrey Gemignani EXC: Artificial solar eclipses in space could help scientists study the sun's corona, improving space weather predictions with the UK-led MESOM mission. KEYS: MESOM, corona, space weather, solar storm, Mullard Space Lab, Surrey Space Centre, solar flares, coronal mass ejection COPY: A U.K.-led space mission will try to experience around 80 total solar eclipses in space, potentially offering scientists an unprecedented glimpse into the sun's mysterious outer atmosphere. The Moon-Enabled Sun Occultation Mission (MESOM), unveiled today at the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting 2025 in Durham, will synchronize its orbit to coincide with solar eclipses in space. If approved by ESA, MESOM would cost no more than $240 million and could be in orbit by 2026-28. MESOM comes in the wake of the first images from Proba-3, a European Space Agency mission to do something very similar — though that will only last for two years. Solar Corona Clearer, longer views of the sun's elusive inner corona — the source of powerful solar flares and storms — are essential if solar physicists are to better understand space weather. Only during a total solar eclipse can the corona be glimpsed from Earth's surface, and even then, only for a few minutes from any one location. Unlike Earth-based total solar eclipses, MESOM aims to align a mini-satellite with the moon's central umbral shadow once every lunar month — 29.6 days. MESOM's unique orbit will repeatedly pass through the apex of the moon's umbral cone, the darkest portion of its shadow, generating near-monthly eclipses. 48-Minute totality These in-space eclipses could last up to 48 minutes, far longer than anything experienced from the ground on Earth. 'MESOM capitalizes on the chaotic dynamics of the Sun-Earth-Moon system to reproduce total solar eclipse conditions in space while using the moon as a natural occulter,' said co-investigator Dr Nicola Baresi, from the Surrey Space Centre. An occulter is something that blocks light from a celestial object. MESOM will have the following instruments on board: Telescope (US Naval Research Lab): imaging the corona. Spectrometer (Aberystwyth & UCL): studying coronal plasma. Spectropolarimeter (Spain): analyzing magnetic fields, sunspots and solar and flares. Getting Closer To The Corona MESOM is a slight upgrade on ESA's current Proba-3 mission. That mission sees two spacecraft align so one can occult the sun and project a shadow onto the other — no moon required. As well as moving into the always-there shadow of the moon, MESOM aims to peer in from just 1.02 solar radii — 35,000 miles (56,000 kilometers) closer than Proba-3. The Proba-3 satellites follow a highly elliptical 19.6-hour orbit ranging from 373 miles (600 km) at perigee to 37,000 miles (60,000 km) at apogee, flying in precision formation only near apogee. At apogee, they're as far away from Earth's gravitational force and atmospheric drag, enabling them to fly in formation autonomously, achieving eclipse-like conditions for six hours. The 'Concorde Eclipse' Although MESOM's 48-minute totality would be impressive, it's less than experienced by Concorde on June 30, 1973, when an experimental Concorde aircraft extended totality from 7 minutes and 4 seconds on the ground to 74 minutes in the air, by flying almost as fast as the moon's shadow. It took off from Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, in the Spanish Canary Islands, and flew at 1,350 mph (2,200 km/h) as the moon's shadow raced across it at 1,500 mph (2,400 km/h). Concorde was able to extend totality from 7 minutes to 4 seconds on the ground. The Longest Total Solar Eclipse From Earth Mathematically, the longest total solar eclipse could last 7 minutes 31 seconds, according to Jean Meeus . The longest total solar eclipse known to have occurred was 7 minutes, 28 seconds on June 15, 743 BC, in the Indian Ocean. However, it's been calculated that the longest so far — 7 minutes, 29 seconds — will occur in the Atlantic Ocean on July 16, 2186. The longest total solar eclipse left this century, with a totality duration of 6 minutes and 23 seconds, will occur on Aug. 2, 2027, close to Luxor, Egypt. Ancient Egypt's capital of Thebes, Luxor, is home to the Valley of the Kings and Queens, Karnak, and several other temples. Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes. The same total solar eclipse with the fields of view of the MESOM instruments superimposed on top of ... More it (i.e. HiBri,LoBri, CHILS and Mag-CHILS). Miloslav Druckmuller, Shadia Habbal, Pavel Starha. Attribution (CC BY 4.0)
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists Line Up Satellites to Create "Artificial Total Solar Eclipse"
Two satellites just carefully lined up to form a perfect "artificial total solar eclipse" in orbit. Earlier this year, the two probes, which are part of the European Space Agency's Proba-3 mission, positioned themselves in a perfect line 492 feet apart to have one of them perfectly obfuscate the Sun's rays. Impressively, they were able to maintain their position with an accuracy down to the millimeter. The outermost satellite then snapped fascinating pictures of the Sun's corona, the outermost part of our star's atmosphere, something that's generally speaking only possible during a natural solar eclipse. The first "Occulter" satellite's 4.6-foot disc cast a three-inch shadow onto the Association of Spacecraft for Polarimetric and Imaging Investigation of the Corona of the Sun (ASPIICS) instrument mounted to the second "Coronagraph" satellite, allowing it to get an uninterrupted view of the Sun's corona. The spectacular satellite dance could give researchers new ways to study solar wind, or the continuous flow of particles from the Sun. It could also give them new views of coronal mass ejections, powerful explosions of plasma and magnetic fields that have been linked to radio blackouts and GPS outages here on Earth. "It is exciting to see these stunning images validate our technologies in what is now the world's first precision formation flying mission," said ESA director of technology Dietmar Pilz in a statement. Researchers behind the stunt are excited to gather even more images and data of the Sun's corona. "I was absolutely thrilled to see the images, especially since we got them on the first try," ASPIICS principal investigator Andrei Zhukov added. "Now we are working on extending the observation time to six hours in every orbit." "Each full image — covering the area from the occulted Sun all the way to the edge of the field of view – is actually constructed from three images," he explained. "Combining the three images gives us the full view of the corona." Best of all, Zhukov and his colleagues found that the satellites' "'artificial eclipse' images are comparable with those taken during a natural eclipse." "The difference is that we can create our eclipse once every 19.6-hour orbit," he added, "while total solar eclipses only occur naturally around once, very rarely twice a year." Scientists are already excited about the glut of new observations that could greatly enhance existing research into the Sun's atmosphere, including efforts to use computer simulations to predict future patterns. "This huge flow of observations will help refine computer models further as we compare and adjust variables to match the real images," said ESA space weather modeling coordinator Jorge Amaya in the statement. More on solar eclipses: Here's What NASA's Rovers See During an Eclipse on Mars
Forbes
19-06-2025
- Science
- Forbes
NASA Spacecraft ‘Touches Sun' For Final Time In Defining Moment For Humankind
The heavily armored Parker Solar Probe has traveled to within just 3.86 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) of the sun's surface — what NASA calls 'hyper close.' It's the third and final time it has performed the feat, following similar achievements on Dec. 24, 2024, and March 22, 2025. Parker launched on Aug. 12, 2018, and has since conducted 23 perihelions — close passes — of the sun, getting to within 3.86 million miles (6.1 million kilometers) twice before today's repeat performnce. For scale, that's four yards from the end zone if the distance between Earth and the sun was the length of an American football field, according to mission scientists. During this final perihelion of the mission, the probe will be traveling at around 430,000 miles per hour (690,000 kilometers per hour). According to NASA, that's fast enough to get from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C., in a single second. Perihelion 24 also sees it forced to withstand temperatures of 1,600 to 1,700 degrees Fahrenheit (870 to 930 degrees Celsius). Its only armor against both temperature and extreme ultraviolet radiation is a carbon composite shield. Parker is in a highly elliptical orbit, which takes 88 days but allows it to occasionally swoop particularly close to the sun. One of the main objectives of the mission is to understand why the sun's corona, its outer atmosphere, is a million times hotter than the photosphere, its surface. The corona is where the solar wind originates from, so solar physicists must understand it better if they are to forecast space weather more accurately. That's important because the state of the solar wind — a stream of charged particles interacting with the Earth's atmosphere — can damage satellites and harm astronauts, as well as cause Northern Lights. The latter half of Parker's mission has coincided with the peak of Solar Cycle 25, the current 11-year-long cycle of the sun, during which our star experiences a waxing and waning of magnetic activity. A study published on June 3 used data from Parker while flying close to the sun, reveal a new source for energetic particles in the solar corona. The mechanism, called magnetic reconnection, heats the solar atmosphere, accelerating solar wind particles. Magnetic reconnection — when magnetic field lines converge, break apart and reconnect in an explosive physical process — is responsible for powerful solar events, such as solar flares and coronal mass ejections. 'We've seen how magnetic reconnection behaves near Earth, but Parker has now shown how potent it is near the sun, where magnetic fields are significantly stronger,' said Dr. Mihir Desai, lead author and a scientist at the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. Parker isn't going anywhere. Locked in the orbit of the sun, it will continue to loop around our star. However, it was gravity assists at Venus that gave the spacecraft enough momentum to get so close to the sun. No, it's within the orbit of Venus, that opportunity is lost, so it won't be able to reach any closer to the sun than it already has done. According to Live Science, the spacecraft's thrusters will eventually run out of fuel, and it will burn up, though its heat shield may remain in orbit for thousands of years.
BBC News
17-06-2025
- Science
- BBC News
Space mission creates first ever artificial solar eclipse
The European Space Agency (ESA) has revealed the first images of an artificial total eclipse created by a pair of satellites in space as part of its Proba-3 mission. In March, the two spacecraft, called the Coronagraph and the Occulter, flew 150 metres apart while perfectly aligned for several hours without being controlled from the extremely precise positions - down to a single millimetre - enabled the satellites to create a total solar eclipse in orbit. The satellites aligned with the Sun in a way that allowed the Occulter spacecraft to block the giant star's bright disc, casting a shadow across the Coronagraph's optical shadow allows the Coronagraph's instrument, which is called ASPIICS, to successfully capture images of the outermost part of the Sun's atmosphere, known as the increasingly need to study the corona, but find it hard to do so without an eclipse because the sun's surface is one million times amazing pictures are uninterrupted by the Sun's bright light."It is exciting to see these stunning images validate our technologies in what is now the world's first precision formation flying mission," said Dietmar Pilz, who is the ESA's director of technology, engineering and quality. What is the Proba-3 mission all about? The Sun's corona can reach temperatures of around 1,000,000 degrees Celsius or more. It's much hotter than the sun's surface below and this temperature difference is something that continues to both intrigue and puzzle researchers. The Proba-3 mission aims to tackle this longstanding mystery by studying the corona in more depth. The Coronagraph spacecraft's instrument ASPIICS is able to see more detail, finding fainter features than other missions. "Seeing the first data from ASPIICS is incredibly exciting," said Joe Zender who is a scientist on the Proba-3 project."ASPIICS will contribute to unravelling long-lasting questions about our home star."Rather than relying on humans, the spacecraft lined themselves up with the sun in a manner "akin to driverless cars", the space agency the spacecraft blasted off in December last year, they had enough fuel to keep going for around two five years, it is expected they will burn up in the Earth's atmosphere.
