The Sun Puffs

影像提供: EIT, The SOHO Consortium, ESA, NASA
Explanation: Our Earth endures bursts of particles from the Sun. On 1997 April 7, at 10 am (EDT), ground monitors of the SOHO spacecraft, which continually monitors the Sun, noticed a weak spot in the solar corona was buckling again, this time letting loose a large, explosive Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). Almost simultaneously, NASA's WIND spacecraft began detecting bursts of radio waves from electrons involved in this magnetic storm. Supersonic waves rippled though the solar corona as a puff of high energy gas shot out into the Solar System. The above image shows two photographs of the Sun taken about 15 minutes apart and subtracted, highlighting the explosion. CME's are not unusual. The CME gas had little lasting effect on the Earth, but likely created fleeting, if not picturesque, Earth auroras.
說明:
      地球常受到太陽太陽粒子爆發的洗禮。在1997年4月7日的美東時間10時，SOHO衛星的地面監控人員注意到，這顆不停監視太陽的衛星發現日冕上之空洞又活躍起來了，並釋放出一個爆發性的大型日冕物質拋射。幾乎在同時，美國太空總署的太陽風探測船也偵測到這個磁暴內部電子運動所發出的電波。超聲速的波穿過日冕，以高能粒子噴流的方式灑向太陽系。上面影像是由拍攝間隔15分鐘的二幅太陽照片相減而得的，目的在於突顯這個爆發事件。日冕物質拋射並不罕見，事件噴出的物質對地球幾乎沒有長期的影響，不過它們有時會誘發短暫但很美麗的地球極光活動。
資料來源: Scientific American
                 Department of Physics, NCKU

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