Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii images hint at coronal heating
Technology
Astronomers using the Inouye solar telescope in Hawaii, operated by the US National Solar Observatory, captured the sharpest images ever of the Sun's surface, spotting tiny structures smaller than 20-km wide near a sunspot.
This could finally help explain why the Sun's outer layer, the corona, is millions of degrees hotter than its actual surface, a mystery that's baffled scientists for years.
Kelvin-Helmholtz vortices twist solar magnetic fields
The Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii caught swirling shapes called Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities (KHIs) at the edge of fast and slow solar plasma.
It's the first time these have been seen on the Sun.
Scientists think these mini-vortices twist up magnetic fields, a key culprit in why field lines become braided and perhaps why the sun's corona is heated.