A Solar Filament Erupts
Explanation:
What's happened to our Sun?
Nothing very unusual -- it just
threw a filament.
Toward the middle of 2012, a long standing
solar filament
suddenly erupted into space producing an energetic Coronal Mass Ejection (CME).
The filament had been held up for days by the Sun's ever changing
magnetic
field
and the timing of the eruption was unexpected.
Watched closely
by the Sun-orbiting Solar Dynamics Observatory, the resulting
explosion
shot
electrons and ions into the Solar System, some of which arrived at Earth three days
later and impacted Earth's
magnetosphere, causing visible
aurorae.
Loops of plasma surrounding an
active region can be seen above the erupting filament
in
the ultraviolet image.
Over the past week the number of sunspots visible on the Sun unexpectedly
dropped to zero, causing speculation that
the Sun
has now passed a very
unusual
solar maximum,
the time in the
Sun's 11-year cycle
when it is most active.
Authors & editors:
Robert Nemiroff
(MTU) &
Jerry Bonnell
(USRA)
NASA Web Site Statements, Warnings,
and Disclaimers
NASA Official: Jay Norris.
Specific
rights apply.
A service of:
LHEA at
NASA /
GSFC
& Michigan Tech. U.
