NASA's Sun-Studying Satellite Images Another Awesome Eruption
An image of a dynamic churning blob of solar plasma -- or hot charged gas -- has been captured by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Solar Dynamics Observatory and released for public consumption.
The image depicts the supercharged material eruption off the side of the sun Sept. 26, and was focused on ionized Helium with a temperature of about 60,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
The SDO is a first-of-its-kind scientific satellite that uses two different imaging instruments, the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly and the Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager, to generate ultra high-definition imagery of the Sun in 13 different wavelengths, according to mission information of the NASA Website.
The wavelengths, associated with one or two different types of ions, were chosen to highlight particular parts of the sun's atmosphere, from the solar surface to the upper reaches of the sun's corona.
The main goal of the SDO mission is to provide insights that help scientists better understand where the sun's energy comes from, how the inside of the sun works and how energy is stored and released in the sun's atmosphere.
That added information will in turn help astronomers predict and better forecast Space Weather, which wholly originates from the sun and affects everything within the star's influence.
The SDO, the first satellite launched under the Living with a Star exploration program at NASA, is expected to orbit the earth and collect solar information for at least five years -- though past satellites have often continued functioning well past their initial design specifications, as mission operators keep the robotic laboratories with new added tests and scientific tasks.
Other satellites share a common system on the earth surface to which they are able to send data and digital images, and where recording units are in place to save the collected data until the satellites can communicate to their mission controllers.
However, the SDO, which doesn't sport its own recording system but needs to collect a giant amount of data, had to have a data collection station on the ground built just for its mission.
As a result, and in order to ensure the SDO's transmissions go through successfully, the satellite is placed in a geosynchronous orbit around Earth -- so it's always in contact with its station in New Mexico.
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