See The Four Jaw-Dropping New 100-Megapixel Close-Ups Of The Sun As New Era Of Science Begins

The brand new Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii has seen “first light” and begun doing science—and it celebrated the occasion with four incredible new close-up images of the Sun.

They’re stunning follow-ups to its highest resolution ever image of the Sun’s surface published just after its construction in 2020.

Now the largest solar ‘scope in the world, the 13 foot/four-meter ground-based Inouye is positioned about 10,000 feet above sea level at Haleakalā Observatories in Maui. Built by NSF’s National Solar Observatory and managed by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA), Inouye has been 20 years in the making.

It’s hoped that Inouye will lead to a leap forward in scientists’ understanding the sun and its impacts on our planet.

The four new images of the Sun, which were taken during June and July, each measure 10,000 pixels square, making each 100 megapixels in size.

Three of them are of the chromosphere, the lower region of the Sun’s atmosphere above the surface. It appears as a pinkish, reddish band around the Moon during the totality phase of a total solar eclipse.

All four images shows a region of around 51,000 miles/82,500 kilometers across at a resolution of 11 miles/18 kilometres per pixel. Some images include the Earth for scale.

“NSF’s Inouye Solar Telescope is the world’s most powerful solar telescope that will forever change the way we explore and understand our sun,” said Sethuraman Panchanathan, National Science Foundation (NSF) Director. “Its insights will transform how our nation, and the planet, predict and prepare for events like solar storms.”

A solar storm sees a mass of charged solar particles ejected into space from the Sun that can arrive at Earth a few days later. Scientists are hoping that Inouye will help increase the warning time for serious solar storms from hours to days.

Solar storms are becoming more frequent in recent months as Solar Cycle 26 hots-up. The Sun has a roughly 11-years cycle that sees its wax and wane in terms of solar activity. Some predict it could be the strongest since records began. The new Inouye Solar Telescope will get a ringside seat as the Sun waxes towards its “solar maximum” in 2024-2025.

The final image, below, shows the Sun’s surface. In it you can see turbulent “boiling” plasma that covers the entire star. The cell-like structures are violent motions that transport heat from the inside of the sun to its surface. The hot solar plasma rises in the bright centers of these cells, cools off, then sinks below the surface in dark lanes in a process known as convection.

Inouye is the world’s largest solar telescope both in terms of the size of its mirror and its aperture. Its genius is in how it remains cool despite being pointed directly at the Sun. Ice is produced at the observatory at night, and there are seven miles of piping to distribute coolant throughout. There are cooling plates on the dome enclosing the telescope that stabilize the temperature around it, while a liquid-cooled metal “donut” blocks most of the sunlight’s energy from the main mirror.

Formerly known as the Advanced Technology Solar Telescope, DKIST was renamed to honour Daniel K. Inouye, a late US senator from Hawaii, who was a tireless proponent of science, technology, engineering and math.

Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.

You may also like...