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May 27, 2009 - The CORONAS-PHOTON has registered the formation of the Sun's southern belt of activity |
The Russian TESIS/ CORONAS-PHOTON Solar Observatory, which has been working in orbit since January 30th, 2009, has photographed one of the most important events in the build up to the upcoming solar cycle - the formation of our star's new southern belt of activity. The first magnetic fields of the new cycle in the southern hemisphere appeared on the Sun's surface on May 23-24th. The emerged areas have a typical NS-configuration, i.e. they have fields of opposing polarities, positioned along the line of solar latitude. Predictably, fields with positive polarity are displaced to the West along the entire southern belt, and negative fields are displaced to the East. Therefore, polarity reversal of magnetic fields has occurred in the Sun's southern hemisphere, and a new magnetic configuration has been formed, which will now remain intact for the whole future cycle.
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The CORONAS-PHOTON has registered the formation of the Sun's southern belt of activity |
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May 21, 2009 - A flame over the Sun |
An astonishingly beautiful and rare solar phenomenon, registered by the TESIS telescopes, has been published on the NASA website in the 'Image of the Week' section. The eastern limb of the Sun was lit up as if by fire for almost three days as around ten 'blazing' protuberances stretched upwards simultaneously into the solar corona, reaching altitudes of over 100 thousand kilometers. The word 'blazing' is not just a beautiful epithet. In this case it characterizes the phenomenon in the best way possible. In both appearance and character these protuberances bear a striking resemblance to tongues of flame bursting upwards from beneath the Sun's surface.
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TESIS - a flame over the Sun |
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May 12, 2009 - Earth Witnesses the First Powerful Areas of the New Solar Cycle |
The first powerful active areas of the new solar cycle have now come into view from Earth. This event was anticipated. Back on 7 May, two space observatories, STEREO (USA) and TESIS/Coronas-Photon (Russia), simultaneously registered a sharp rise in activity on the eastern edge of the solar disk. TESIS was then only able to see the peaks of bright magnetic loops stretching into the corona, but STEREO was lucky enough to observe much more - she succeeded in 'glimpsing the future' and captured images of the new areas as they are visible today from our planet. This was possible thanks to the observatory's unique orbit: two STEREO satellites, launched on 26 October, 2006, are now at a distance of over 100 million kilometres from Earth and allow us to see the Sun from the side, at an angle of 47 degrees.
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Earth Witnesses the First Powerful Areas of the New Solar Cycle |
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