The Sun has texture, and now we can see it. 🌞
Using the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope of the United States National Science Foundation, a team of astronomers captured the highest-resolution images ever taken of the visible surface of our star. What appears there is not a uniform ball of fire: they are swirls of boiling plasma, some barely 19 kilometers in diameter, moving like whirlpools in water during a storm.
Experts believe this could hold the key to a mystery that has remained unsolved for decades: how energy accumulates before erupting in flares and solar eruptions. Understanding this process could help us better predict solar storms that affect satellites and communications on Earth. 🤯
Did you ever imagine the Sun looked like this up close?