Scientists are getting warmer in their hunt for a reason why the sun’s outer atmosphere is so hot. The key may be magnetic waves long sought but only recently spotted, an international team reports in the July 28 Nature.
Combined with observations reported earlier this year (SN: 1/29/11, p. 12) of high-speed gas jets shooting up into the sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona, the magnetic waves may explain why the thin halo of superhot gas blazes at temperatures as high as a couple million kelvins. The waves may also account for the force behind the solar wind particles that stream off the corona at hundreds of kilometers per second.
“These are results that have been awaited for 50 years,” says Peter Cargill of Imperial College London and the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, who wasn’t involved with the work.