In a recently released, incredibly precise image of the sun, a polar crown prominence, also known as a mass of falling material, was visible.A breathtaking image captured by an astrophotographer shows a massive wall of plasma being spit out near the sun’s south pole and then tumbling down toward the solar surface at impossibly high speeds.With specialist camera equipment, Eduardo Schaerger Poupeau, who is based close to Rafaela in Argentina, obtained the arresting image on March 9. According to Poupeau, the plasma wall “raised soмe 100,000 kм [kiloмeters, or 62,000 мiles] above the sun surface.” To put that in perspective, it is equivalent to about eight Earths stacked on top of one another. “On my computer screen, it appeared to be hundreds of plastik threads.”
A polar crown prominence (PCP) is a dazzling phenomenon similar to normal solar prominences, which are loops of plasma ejected from the solar surface by magnetic fields. However, PCPs occur near the sun’s magnetic poles at latitudes between 60 and 70 degrees North and South, which often causes them to collapse back towards the sun because the magnetic fields near the poles are much stronger. This collapse back to the sun has earned them the nickname “plasma waterfalls.”
The plasma within PCPs is not actually in freefall because it is still contained within the magnetic field that initially spat them out. However, the plasma travels downwards at speeds of up to 22,370 mph (36,000 km/h), which is much faster than the magnetic fields should allow based on experts’ calculations, according to NASA. Researchers are still trying to figure out how this is possible. Understanding the behavior of PCPs is important for predicting space weather, which can impact satellites, power grids, and other technological infrastructure.
A solar image taken on March 10 by NASA’s Solar Dynamic Observatory. The picture circles the “plasa waterfall.” (Image credit: SDO/NASA)
According to a study published in 2021 in the journal Frontiers in Physics, PCPs experience two phases of eruption: a slow phase during which the plasma rises slowly, and a fast phase during which the plasma rushes toward the top of its altitude. More study is required to determine whether this will have an impact on how the particle rises to the surface.
Sped-up video footage of a PCP rising and falling aƄoʋe the sun on Noʋ. 30 2006. (Iмage credit: NASA)
Solar physicists often study solar prominences because they can be accompanied by coronal mass ejections, or massive magnetized plasma plumes that can fully break away from the sun and slam into Earth. But PCPs are also of interest to nuclear physicists because the sun’s magnetic field seems to be particularly adept at containing the plasma loops in the polar regions, which could provide insights that help researchers improve experimental nuclear fusion reactors.
PCPs are very common and could happen almost every day, although images of the phenomenon like the one Poupeau captured are rare, according to NASA. However, like many other plasma-related solar phenomena, PCPs could become even more frequent and intense as the sun ramps up to a peak in its 11-year solar cycle known as the solar maximum.
On Feb. 2, 2022, a massive solar prominence, just below the latitude needed to be deemed a PCP, broke off from the sun and became trapped in an enormous and fast-moving polar vortex around the sun’s north pole for about 8 hours. On Sept. 5, 2022, an enormous, undulating stream of plasma shot across the solar surface like a snake, and on Sept. 24, 2022, a colossal 1-million-mile long plume of plasma erupted from the sun’s surface after another prominence snapped in half. The study of solar phenomena is crucial for understanding the behavior of our nearest star and predicting space weather, which can impact our technological infrastructure.
Originally puƄlished on LiʋeScience.com
Source: amazingastronomy.thespaceacademy.org
