Remarkable imagery shows NASA probe hit by a solar storm
Technology trends
A NASA spacecraft captured incredible imagery as it flew through an eruption from the sun recently. Pictures beamed back to scientists on Earth even show the fiery ejection “vacuuming up” space dust left over from the formation of the solar system.
The fly-through by NASA’s Parker Solar Probe took place on September 5 and NASA shared the imagery (below) on Monday.
Another first! Our Parker Solar Probe flew through an eruption from the Sun, and saw it “vacuuming up” space dust left over from the formation of the solar system. It's giving @NASASun scientists a better look at space weather and its potential effects on Earth.… pic.twitter.com/AcwLXOlI6m
— NASA (@NASA) September 18, 2023
The probe found itself in the middle of one of the most powerful coronal mass ejections (CMEs) ever recorded, according to the space agency, a chance event that gives scientists a treasure trove of potentially revealing data.
CMEs are immense eruptions from the sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona. They’re so powerful that they could potentially disrupt communications and navigation technologies such as satellites, and even knock out power grids on Earth.
Interplanetary dust comprises tiny particles from asteroids, comets, and planets, and is found throughout the solar system. This month you can even observe interplanetary dust in the form of a faint glow called zodiacal light.
NASA said that learning more about how CMEs interact with interplanetary dust could help scientists better determine a CME’s speed of travel toward Earth, which in turn could lead to improvements in forecasting precisely when our planet feels their effects. What’s particularly exciting is that the close-up imagery gives scientists their best chance yet of characterizing dust dynamics in the wake of a CME, something that’s hard to do when observing such an event from a distance.
“These interactions between CMEs and dust were theorized two decades ago, but had not been observed until Parker Solar Probe viewed a CME act like a vacuum cleaner, clearing the dust out of its path,” Guillermo Stenborg, an astrophysicist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), which built and operates Parker, said in a report on NASA’s website.
NASA said that the CME displaced the dust to about six million miles from the sun, adding that it was replenished almost immediately by other interplanetary dust in the solar system.
The Parker Solar Probe was developed as part of NASA’s Living With a Star program to investigate aspects of the sun-Earth system that directly impact life and society. The spacecraft launched in 2018 and the mission is scheduled to last at least eight years.
Editors’ Recommendations
-
Telescopes turn on Parker Solar Probe’s latest approach to the sun
-
Sun throws a Halloween tantrum, with a solar flare impacting Earth this weekend
-
Parker Solar Probe detects a natural radio signal coming from Venus
-
Parker Solar Probe on record-breaking approach to the sun
-
NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory spots biggest solar flare since 2017
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Parker probe data reveals link between solar flares and cosmic radiation
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe approaching the sun. NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has already revealed new information about our star, capturing the first image from within the sun’s atmosphere in 2018 and capturing a video of solar wind on its second orbit of the sun in 2019. Now, data from the probe has revealed how solar flares contribute to the sun’s radiation, which can cause problems for spacecraft and even astronauts as it spreads across the solar system.
Read more
Parker Solar Probe makes a second orbit of the sun, captures solar wind on video
NASA’s Parker Solar Probe approaching the sun. NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio
The Parker Solar Probe, launched last year, has completed its second orbit around the sun.
Read more
NASA’s satellite projects will study the sun using solar sailing
NASA has selected two proposals to demonstrate technologies to improve science observations in deep space. The proposals could help NASA develop better models to predict space weather events that can affect astronauts and spacecraft, such as coronal mass ejections (CMEs). In this image, taken by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory on Feb. 27, 2000, a CME is seen erupting from the Sun, which is hidden by the disk in the middle, so the fainter material around it can be seen. ESA/NASA/SOHO
Small satellites can be used for anything from collecting images and videos of Earth to exploring the Solar System, and as the technology improves, more and more uses will become possible. NASA has been searching for ideas to push ahead the capabilities of the hardware, and the agency has just announced two new projects to demonstrate the potential of small satellites.
Read more
https://www.digitaltrends.com/space/nasa-parker-probe-hit-by-a-solar-storm/, Digital Trends
Read More
