Twisted roots for solar jets

STEREO spacecraft capture new images revealing the role of tangled magnetic fields in generating the sun’s outbursts

Solar physicists have for years theorized that violent outbursts from the sun have their roots in contorted loops of magnetic field that rise up from the sun’s visible surface, suddenly snap like rubber bands and then reconnect with neighboring fields. Researchers now report that they have some of the first graphic evidence in support of this twisted thinking.