INCREDIBLE... Photos of the Sun
Lunar Transit
The dark moon passes between the Sun and imaging equipment aboard NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) spacecraft, creating a partial eclipse. Launched on February 11, 2010, the orbiter will observe the Sun for the next five years, providing scientists with a better understanding of how the Sun affects the Earth's atmospheric chemistry and climate.
Ring of Fire
A dense cloud of loop-shaped gas erupts from the Sun's surface. Solar prominences, as this occurrence is called, can loop thousands of miles into space and can persist in the Sun's corona for several months. The largest known prominence, an extension over 430,000 miles — roughly equivalent to the star's radius — was observed in 2010.
Sunspots
The dark areas are caused by intense magnetic activity that create areas of reduced surface temperature. Sunspots expand and contract as they travel at a few hundred miles per second across the surface of the Sun. They can be as large as 50,000 miles in diameter, making them at times visible to the naked eye from Earth.
Silhouette
The Space Shuttle Atlantis transits the Sun during its 30th mission. This photo was taken from the Kennedy Space Center before the last servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope.
Shining Star
Former NASA astronaut Joseph Tanner is photogrtaphed during a spacewalk outside the Space Shuttle Discovery in low Earth orbit during the second servicing mission of the Hubble Space Telescope. The Sun is visible behind him. Even when the Sun is shining, the sky appears dark in low Earth orbit, because there isn't enough atmosphere to diffuse sunlight.
Loops of Plasma
Anchored in the photosphere, these coronal loops measure up to 60,000 miles and can be observed between the lower corona and the transition region of the Sun. Flowing along the magnetic field, the arches begin to rise when the plasma heats up, and crash down when it cools at more than 60 miles per second. Scientists have recently suggested that they heat the corona to temperatures about 300 times the sun's surface.
Jet Streams
Spicules, above, rise from the Sun's interior to its chromosphere at a supersonic jet speed of over 30,000 miles per hour. At any given time, there are more than 60,000 spicules active on the Sun. They have a lifespan of about 5 minutes.
http://www.time.com/time/photogaller...235065,00.html
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