Posted 08.24.2010 at 5:41 pm
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Spotting Sunspots
Big Bear Solar Observatory/NJIT
Researchers at Big Bear Solar Observatory have tuned their adaptive optics array and achieved first light, capturing this image of a sunspot that is now the most detailed ever captured in visible light. The image was captured with Big Bear’s New Solar Telescope (NST), a brand new instrument (as the name implies) with a resolution of just 50 miles on the sun’s surface.
The NST is the precursor to an even-larger telescope, the Advanced Technology Solar Telescope (ATST), which will be constructed over the next decade, allowing Big Bear researchers to build a new kind of adaptive optics system known as multi-conjugate adaptive optics, that should provide them with a clear, distortion-free means of observing the sun from Earth in unrivaled detail.
In the meantime, NST will collect incredibly detailed images of solar phenomena like this that should help researchers understand the complexities of solar weather and its impact on the space climate in our neighborhood of the solar system.
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Beautiful. Nature truly is the greatest artist in the universe.
No, Frodo, don't put on the ring! He'll see you!!!
It really is beautiful though
Ninja'd ^^^^^
Darn, that's exactly what I thought when I saw it.
ATST... isn't that the two-legged walker the Empire used on Endor? I'd say keep the Ewoks away.
You wonder if they thought of this before using this accronym, and how long before they have an ATAT.
Advanced Technology Aerial Telescope?
The picture is cool, kinda like a flower.
I bet PopSci could double the site's traffic if they kept a running database of science info.
For instance: This is an article about sun spots but, haven't I seen articles on PS about theories on how they work?
All of that is just buried in the archives now though. -- What if PS kept track of those related pieces in a Wiki-style linked-to section.
Not only would be it enriching for the website but, it would be fascinating to be able to see, over time, how the theories and discoveries change and evolve.
-- Just a thought.
looks like the suns butthole is puckering up....
@TheFourth - Nature, or Nature's God.
its looks like the suns asshole. eww
Looks like its magnetic.
When I stare at the middle of the picture and try to focus my eyes so as if i´m looking at something that is much further away than my monitor the whole yellow area starts to sway in a wavy motion as if it was on fire.
Try it its impressive :)
I was gonna comment on how it looked like the eye of sauron, too. lol
So why name something "New _____". It's just gonna sound silly when there's another _____.
Yeah, the eye of sauron comment was better. hehe
Looks like a localized singularity.
Ladies and gentlemen. The first pick of the sun's browneye.
How big is that spot relative to Earth? Looks like Earth would fall right into it.
@JAYMCD84
The pic is 50 miles, but it is not stated how compressed or cropped this part is. Looks like (if it is only compressed) to be about 15 - 18 miles across and only 6-8 miles across the central void-thingy.
I also instantly thought the eye of Sauron. After looking at it for a while though, it reminded me of the way Van Gogh painted sunflowers :))
I wonder what the soloar-dynamics are bordering the sunspot?
Gorgeous nature at its best or worst deciding on your own definition.And to this previous comments that say it kinda looks like a flower i disagree and agree because no flower on earth or any planet i wager is that large.
@HereticPunk: No no, the *resolution* is fifty miles, not the image captured - this observatory is here on the ground, not a camera orbiting the sun or something.
It's fifty miles *to the pixel.* It's still a very big spot. And most likely, the image has been compressed as well as cropped (though the latter isn't relevant to estimating the size given the above.)
So, even if it wasn't compressed, this would be at least a 3000 mile cool spot, if I'm estimating appropriately from my screen because I'm too lazy to check the actual image. Not Earth-sized, but close enough.
Sunspots can be up to 50000 miles wide!!! I don't know about this one;but they are big enough for our little blue planet to dive into!
And beautiful!!!
You wonder if they thought of this before using this accronym, and how long before they have an ATAT.
Advanced Technology Aerial Telescope?
The picture is cool, kinda like a flower.
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