Spacecraft And Specialized telescopes Study the sun closely for decades and investigates the secrets of its spots, Torches and Corona. But neither human nor robot-like eyes had seen the north or south posts of the sun well.
On Wednesday, the European Space Agency released the first clear images of the South Pole of the Sun, which were caught at the end of March by his spacecraft of the solar orbiter.
“It is the first time ever that humanity has had a picture of the poles of the sun,” said Carole Mundell, director of science for the European Space Agency. “It’s a great achievement.”
Scientists have previously had vague glimpse of the poles of the sun. Those side views, however, are related to ‘looking through grass’, said Mathew Owens, a space physicist at the University of Reading in England, who added that it was difficult to find out what is happening in the Poles and how they differ from other regions of the star.
By studying his polar extremes, scientists hope to gain new insights into the sun and how it behaves.
And the best is yet to come – later this year people will get our first images of the North Pole of the sun from Solar Orbiter, before the spacecraft is increasingly higher and lower above the poles of the sun for even better view.
The $ 550 million (€ 500 million) Solar Orbiter, the size of a car and wearing 10 scientific instruments, launched on February 10, 2020In a job that repeatedly flew through Venus. These encounters give the spacecraft a gravitational kick, so that it can push itself from the plane of the track that follow the planets around the sun and to view the poles in a higher angle.
Without the help of these planetary catapults it is extremely difficult to get above the poles of the sun and requires a huge amount of fuel. Only one spacecraft has flown over the solar posts, NASA and ESA Ulysses Spacewho worked from 1990 to 2009. But the spacecraft missed a camera to make images, with only scientific instruments.
Solar Orbiter has several cameras in reverse to capture images of the sun. In March, after four Flybys van Venus, the spacecraft dived about 32 million miles over the South Pole of the sun at an angle of about 17 degrees, enough to offer these very first snapshots of what it looks like.
“We have never had this vision before, which has been phenomenal,” says Nour Rawafi, a project scientist for NASA’s Parker Solar Sound Mission, who is currently flying Closer to the sun Then some spacecraft in history. “Seeing the Poles will really open a new window in trying to understand the solar atmosphere and the interior of the sun.”
The images reveal a speckled pattern of magnetic activity on the pole, caused by enormous fractions in the surface of the sun while magnetic fields in and out. The sun is currently leaving its period of peak activity called Solar Maximum, which takes place in a 11-year-old cycle With sunneming, and scientists think that this can lead to the magnetic field turning around in the sun. That may mean that there is currently no real magnetic north or south pole, resulting in the speckles effect.
“When the sun is minimal, you have a North Pole and a South Pole, each with its own magnetic polarity,” said Anik de Groof, Mission Manager of Solar Orbiter. Now the magnetic field is a ‘kind of mess’,’ she said, based on the observations of Solar Orbiter, without dominant polarity on one of the two extreme.
Studying the polar regions should help scientists investigate the various strengths of Zonnemaxima. Be able to anticipate the intensity of every 11-year cycle can warn humanity of the Dangers for satellites And land infrastructure From space weather.
“If you get the field in the Poles a bit, it changes what happens in the equator,” said Dr. Owens.
The images also emphasize the lower activity on the poles of the sun compared to its equatorial areas, where the rotation of the sun and the churn of interior cause mass eruptions. And Zonne -Oorbiter will help to study why the solar wind – loaded particles of the surface of the sun – travels much faster from the quieter poles than of the Zonne -Evenaar. “We really want to know how the field is structured there,” said Dr. Owens, referring to the magnetic field.
Another unresolved solar system is why the Wispry outdoor sphere of the sun, his Corona is, that is hot – about two million degrees Fahrenheit, compared to only 11,000 degrees Fahrenheit on the surface.
Sun -orbiter may help because there are plasma movements at different temperatures above the South Pole of the sun. “This will help us reconstruct how plasma behaves and moves,” said Dr. De Groof.
In October, scientists will have a view of the North Sun Pallow that have already been taken by the spacecraft, but still have to be sent to the earth. Their goal is to look for differences between the two Poles.
In 2027 and 2029, Solar Orbiter will reach even higher tendencies, the first 24 degrees and then 33 degrees, when the sun is on its way to the minimum of the sun.
“We expect major changes in the Poles,” said Dr. De Groof.
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