December 2010 - The Sun Today with Dr. C. Alex Young

December 30, 2010

On December 26, SOHO discovered its 2000th comet.

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Solar Observations

SOHO’S 2000th Comet Spotted By Student

On December 26, SOHO discovered its 2,000th comet. Drawing on help from citizen scientists around the world, SOHO has become the single greatest comet finder of all time. This is all the more impressive since SOHO was not specifically designed to find […]

December 21, 2010

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Solar Observations

A CME Triple Play

SOHO’s LASCO C2 and C3 coronagraphs caught the action as three, separate coronal mass ejections (CMEs) blasted out in succession from the Sun (Dec. 12, 2010). These were each distinct and unconnected events. The first CME event (directly on the […]

December 12, 2010

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Solar Observations

Epic Solar Filament Eruption from Dec. 6, 2010 Seen by STEREO

A very long solar filament that had been snaking around the Sun erupted (Dec. 6, 2010) with a flourish. STEREO (Behind) caught the action in dramatic detail in extreme ultraviolet light of Helium. It had been almost a million km […]

December 6, 2010

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Solar Observations

Arcing Loops

Arcing loops above an active region put on a slinky-like show for SDO, evidence of the dynamic, magnetic struggles taking place below (Nov. 28-30, 2010). Particles spiraling along magnetic field lines trace their paths as they gracefully shift and change. […]

December 2, 2010

Categories

Missions

Happy Birthday SOHO!! 15 Years!!

The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory or SOHO is by many accounts the granddaddy of modern solar astronomy. SOHO is not the first space based solar observatory but it has truly ushered in a golden age for solar physics. The mission […]

December 1, 2010

Categories

Solar Observations

Seven-Day Sun

For seven days SDO’s HMI instrument watched as a small sunspot group morphed, merged and grew into two large sunspots (Nov. 13-19, 2010) as other sunspots begin to emerge as well. We selected an image about every 15 minutes (approximately […]