NASA has shared a stunning new image of an active sunspot on the Sun’s surface.
A sunspot dubbed AR3006 on Tuesday exploded, producing an intense X1.5-class solar flare.
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NASA captured the extreme ultraviolet flash using its Solar Dynamics Observatory, which has been observing the Sun since 2010.
Radiation from the flare caused a shortwave radio blackout around the Atlantic Ocean.
Similarly, radio transmissions that operate at frequencies below ~30 MHz were weakened for more than an hour after the flare.
Interestingly, the active sunspot has been described by space experts at SpaceWeather.com as “mixed-up”.
Sunspot AR3006 is supposed to have a positive-negative (+/-) magnetic field, however, deep inside its core the polarity is reversed, experts explained.
“The mixture of magnetic polarities makes this sunspot interesting and dangerous,” they said.
“When opposite polarities bump together, it can light the fuse of magnetic reconnection–the explosive power source of solar flares.”
Along with the flare, experts also noticed some coronal mass ejection (CME) activity from the sun’s southern hemisphere.
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“It is unclear if these CMEs are related to the X-flare or instead some other, lesser explosions that happened at almost the same time,” SpaceWeather.com reported.
At this time, NOAA analysts trying to figure out if one of the CMEs might hit Earth.
What is a sunspot?
Sunspots refer to visible dark areas in the Sun’s photosphere as a result of “intense magnetic flux pushing up from further within the solar interior,” the NOAA explained.
Scientists use the known sunspot count to assess our Sun’s solar activity in 11-year cycles.
Each cycle consists of peaks and troughs known as ‘solar maximum’ and ‘solar minimum,’ respectively.
What are solar flares and CMEs?
A solar fare is an eruption of intense high-energy radiation from the sun’s surface. A CME is a type of solar flare.
CMEs typically expel huge amounts of plasma from the Sun’s outer layer, called the corona.
When solar flares hit Earth’s magnetic field, they can cause geomagnetic storms that affect our satellites and the power grid.
Each solar storm that hits Earth is graded by severity.
Some cause radio blackouts and can pose a threat to astronauts on the ISS.
A minor storm can confuse migrating animals that rely on the Earth’s magnetic field for a sense of direction.
One good thing about solar storms is that they can produce very pretty natural light displays like the northern lights.
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