|
| Andhra Pradesh ~ India ~ International ~ City ~ Entertainment ~ Business ~ Bullion ~ Forex ~ Sports ~ Technology ~ Health ~ Features |
|
Home
/ Technology News / 2008 / April 2008 / April 2, 2008 Scientists find the source of massive solar fountains |
Solarpowergetics Installs Bright Solar Outdoor Lights in Southern California, Power to the People
Canadian Solar to Present at the 2007 Deutsche Bank Technology Conference
Suntech to Announce First Quarter 2007 Financial Results on May 29, 2007
Global Solar Photovoltaic Market Breathes Fire After Initial 'Feedstock' Choke
First Gas Discovery under NELP named - Annapurna
Hourglass figures not always healthy for women
Having an imperfect body may not be all that bad, says a new article, which claims that imperfections come with substantial benefits for some women. ANI
Sleep terrors may run in the family
A Canadian study of twins suggests that night terrors, which send children into sudden inconsolable screaming, may run in the family. ANI
Swedish scientists make body-swapping a virtual reality
Cognitive neuroscientists at the Swedish medical university Karolinska Institutet (KI) have successfully created the illusion of body swapping by making subjects perceive the bodies of mannequins and other people as their own. ANI
A team of scientists has used the Hinode spacecraft to find the origin and driver of huge fountains of hot gas on the Sun, which travel at tens of thousands of km per hour and reach great heights.
London, April 2 : A team of scientists has used the Hinode spacecraft to find the origin and driver of huge fountains of hot gas on the Sun, which travel at tens of thousands of km per hour and reach great heights.
On the Sun, huge fountains of hot gas erupt in the atmosphere, or corona, every few minutes. These are immense magnetic structures that thread through the solar atmosphere.
Now, scientists have used the Hinode spacecraft to find the origin and driver of these fountains.
Increases in pressure at the base of the Sun's magnetic field cause enormous jets of hot gas to shoot upwards into the solar atmosphere. Once the pressure ceases, the hot gases stop soaring into the atmosphere and fall back towards the solar surface.
The changes in pressure are caused by rearrangements of the Sun's magnetic field, a continual process that results in looping cycles of increasing and decreasing pressure and, consequentially, intermittent solar fountains.
Using the Extreme Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer (EIS), one of the instruments on Hindoe, scientists have generated images of the Sun, which give information on how fast its gases are moving.
"EIS has observed the Sun's fountains in unprecedented detail and it has enabled us to narrow down the fountains' origins for the first time", comments team member Deb Baker.
"We have also been able to find what drives the fountains by using computer experiments to replicate solar conditions," he added.
According to team leader Dr Michelle Murray from the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, "The computer experiments demonstrate that when a new section of magnetic field pushes through the solar surface it generates a continual cycle of fountains."
"But new magnetic fields are constantly emerging across the whole of the solar surface and so our results can explain a whole multitude of fountains that have been observed with Hinode," she added.
ANI
