February 19, 2002 – August 15, 2002 Sunscapes: Images of Our Magnetic Star

Most people don't give the Sun, the nearest of all stars, a second thought. Neither its presence nor its apparent stability is questioned. If it were, it would quickly become clear that the Sun is a star whose variability affects us in many ways. It impacts Earth's climate with effects that are yet to be fully understood. It also affects our technology, as eruptions on the Sun interrupt communications, play havoc with navigation systems, generate radiation that is harmful to astronauts and airline passengers, and occasionally push power grids to failure. The cause of this variability is the Sun's magnetic field.

The magnetic field of the Sun shapes its atmosphere from the surface to well beyond the orbit of the Earth. It heats the atmospheric gases to temperatures that are nearly a thousand times higher than the temperature of the surface. This atmosphere glows at many different colors (wavelengths), depending on the temperature of the gas. Special optical systems and detectors allow us to image this mysteriously glowing Sun, with "false" colors added, giving visual form to things our unaided eyes could never see.

This exhibit, on view at the National Academy of Sciences from February 4 to August 15, 2002, presents the most recent research and pictures of the sun. The exhibition encompasses images from the NASA Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE), the Extreme Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope (EIT), the Large Area Solar Coronal Observatory (LASCO), and the Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI) telescopes on the ESA/NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO).

Magnetic field shapes the solar corona

A magnetic explosion

The Sun's hot atmosphere: the corona

For more information on the science behind this exhibition, please click here or visit http://vestige.Imsal.com/TRACE/POD/Sunscapes.html.

Click here for information on the accompanying Lecture to be held on February 18.