Credit: NASA
Candid Snaps of a Star's Outburst
Flares from the sun are the most violent events in the solar system. These
explosions, originating just above the solare surface, spew damaging high
energy particles and radiation into space. The earth's atmosphere and
magnetic field protects us from the most harmful effects of solar flares,
but solar flares can damage communication satellites and other complex
equipment (including humans) placed in space. Though solar flares were first seen in
1859, the physical processes behind these eruptions are still not very
well understood. A new space observatory promises to dramatically help
improve our understanding of these dangerous explosions. The new satellite
is called the High Energy Solar Spectroscopic Image, or HESSI. HESSI, an international
collaboration led by Prof. Robert Lin (University of California, Berkeley)
as principal investigator, will study the production of energetic particles
and high energy X-rays in flares using a unique combination of X-ray and
gamma-ray imaging and spectroscopy. This will, for the first time, allow
astronomers to make a movie of the evolution of the high energy spectrum of
solar flares, to identify the physical process behind the eruption. HESSI
was launched on February 5, 2002, and is currently in a check-out mode just
prior to obtaining its first science results.
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Page Author: Dr. Michael F.
Corcoran
Last modified February 18, 2002
