Status: 05/18/2022 7:15 p.m
A spacecraft has transmitted images of the Sun’s outer atmosphere to Earth. According to the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, the corona has never been imaged in such detail.
Images from the ESA mission were released for the first time on Wednesday. The Solar Orbiter spacecraft captured the measurement data at the end of March, from a distance of 48 million kilometers from the sun. According to the researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS), this was the point closest to the sun on the probe’s orbit to the star. So far, no probe with imaging instruments has come closer to the sun.
Images also show the Sun’s polar region
The South Pole of the Sun, taken on March 30, 2022.
The images provide insight into the structure of the solar corona, i.e. the outer hot atmosphere. There, plasma with a temperature of more than one million degrees flows, captured by powerful magnetic fields. Violent particle and radiation bursts occur again and again. According to the MPS experts, the probe witnessed such eruptions several times during the days of its flyby.
The MPS is involved in four of the ten scientific instruments on board the probe and in the evaluation of the data. As early as October, Solar Orbiter is expected to get even closer to the sun. Then the space probe and the star should only be separated by 42 million kilometers.
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