William Atkins
Saturday, 06 February 2010 09:00
Science -
Space
Page 1 of 4
The NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory is ready to launch on February 9, 2010, for a really big look at our Sun. It is expected to “unravel the mysteries of solar variability.”
The February 25, 2010 NASA media brief “
Solar Dynamics Observatory: The ‘Variable Sun’” states that NASA’s latest space observatory will
“… make IMAX-quality movies of solar explosions, peer beneath the stellar surface to see the sun's inner dynamo, and--researchers hope--unravel the mysteries of solar variability.”An artist’s concept of the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), as it approaches the Sun, is provided by NASA at this
website.
Of special note: Several articles on the SDO mission are also available on this website.
The five-year, 3-month primary mission of the SDO is to analyze solar variability within the Sun. And, it will do it with greater detail than ever before.
In fact, NASA states,
“It will observe the sun faster, deeper, and in greater detail than previous observatories, breaking barriers of time-scale and clarity that have long blocked progress in solar physics.”For instance, magnetic fields caused by sunspots will be photographed in high definition with a resolution that is ten times better than any previous photographic instrument.
NASA says the resolution will be “
big and crisp enough to fill the screen of an IMAX theatre.”Page two continues with a comparison of the big improvement in speed and resolution that the SDO spacecraft provides for its study of the Sun, as compared to older technology space observatories.
