Sun's Atmosphere Is 1 Million Degrees Celsius Hot, And We Finally Know Why

The European Space Agency and NASA¡¯s Solar Orbiter manage to spot a rather strange phenomenon of ¡®campfires¡¯ in the solar atmosphere last year which revealed that the outer layer of the sun was hotter than the core. New discovery offers a better understanding of this strange phenomenon.

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ESA

Sun is known to provide warmth and energy to planets around the solar system, including the Earth of course. What¡¯s strange is that its surface maxes out at a temperature of 5,500 degrees celsius, which is fairly hot. However, its atmosphere dubbed the corona is several times hotter going as high as a million degrees celsius.

This only makes us think of the common Hindi saying, ¡°chai se zyada ketli garam¡±, while also defying logic and making scientists believe there might be something else responsible for this. And now, a new study presented at the European Geosciences Union General Assembly offers some explanation.

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The study has made use of computer simulations to model emissions of energy from the sun, with an intention of creating flares like ones that get detected and measured in scientific instruments. While the simulations ran per usual they discovered brightenings that were identical in scale to the campfires which were observed last year.

Study co-author, Dr Hardi Peter of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, explained in the news release, "The model generated brightenings just like the campfires. Furthermore, it traces out the magnetic field lines, allowing us to see the changes of the magnetic field in and around the brightening events over time, telling us that a process called component reconnection seems to be at work."

NASA

ESA explained reconnection as the process by which magnetic fields break and reconnect, and each time they do so, they release energy. According to Yajie Chen, the first study author and a PhD student at Peking University in China, the energy released during these ¡®brightenings¡¯ could explain the hot temperatures of the sun¡¯s atmosphere.

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Researchers concluded stating, ¡°Based on our study, we propose that the majority of campfire events found by EUI (Extreme Ultraviolet Imager) are driven by component reconnection and our model suggests that this process significantly contributes to the heating of the corona above the quiet Sun."

ESA

Researchers do state that further research is needed on the topic, but its recent findings are definitely impressive, considering that the Solar Orbiter that has captured the images of the corona isn¡¯t even in service yet.

As of now, the spacecraft is only in a ¡®cruise phase¡¯ where its current goal is instrument calibration. Its regular functioning will commence later this year.