2000 SPACE SCIENCE VIDEOTAPES |
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Tape Title | Record ID | Date Produced | TRT: |
Synopsis |
| FOUNTAINS OF FIRE ILLUMINATE SOLAR MYSTERY | G00-087 | 09/26/00 | 00:05:05 | Dramatic new images from NASA show enormous fountains of multimillion-degree, electrified gas in the atmosphere of the Sun. The pictures have helped solve a 30-year-old mystery of how the solar atmosphere is heated to temperatures 1000 times greater than the
Sun's visible surface.
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TAPE CONTENTS: |
| ITEM (1): Immense Fountains of Fire - Dramatic new images from NASA show enormous fountains of multimillion-degree, electrified gas in the atmosphere of the Sun. The pictures have helped solve a 30-year-old mystery of how the solar atmosphere is heated to temperatures 1000 times greater than the Sun's visible surface. Scientists discovered this important clue for solving the long-standing mystery of the hot solar atmosphere while observing the gas fountains (known as coronal loops) in unprecedented detail with NASA's Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE) spacecraft. Scientists are interested in the Sun's outer atmosphere, called the corona, because eruptive events occurring in this region can disrupt high-technology systems on Earth. Moreover, studies of the solar corona will help astronomers better understand other stars, which cannot be observed in as fine detail as the Sun. The solar loops are so large that they can span 30 planet Earths.
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| ITEM (2): Solar Eruption - The new observations reveal the location of the unidentified energy source, showing that most of the heating occurs low in the corona, within about 10,000 miles (16,000 kilometers) from the Sun's visible surface. The gas fountains form arches (some more than 300,000 miles high and capable of spanning 30 Earths) as gas emerges from the solar surface, is heated and rises, then cools and crashes back to the surface at more than 60 miles per second (100 kilometers per second). Millions of different-sized arches, called coronal loops, comprise the corona, and a 30-year old theory assumes that the loops are heated evenly throughout their height. The TRACE observations show that instead, most of the heating must occur at the bases of the coronal loops, near where they emerge from and return to the solar surface.
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| ITEM (3): Changing Our Undertsanding of Other Stars - Scientists are interested in the Sun's outer atmosphere, called the corona, because eruptive events occurring in this region can disrupt high-technology systems on Earth. Moreover, studies of the solar corona will help astronomers better understand other stars, which cannot be observed in as fine detail as the Sun.
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| ITEM (4): TRACE Animation - NASA's Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE) mission, launched in April, 1998, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, is greatly improving understanding of events in the Sun's atmosphere. TRACE is training it's powerful telescope on the "transition region" of the Sun's atmosphere, a dynamic region between the relatively cool surface and lower atmosphere regions of the Sun (about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit) and the extremely hot upper atmosphere (the corona) (up to 3 million degrees Fahrenheit).
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| ITEM (5): Reporter package - Dramatic new images from NASA show enormous fountains of multimillion-degree, electrified gas in the atmosphere of the Sun. The pictures have helped solve a 30-year-old mystery of how the solar atmosphere is heated to temperatures 1000 times greater than the Sun's visible surface. Scientists discovered this important clue for solving the long-standing mystery of the hot solar atmosphere while observing the gas fountains (known as coronal loops) in unprecedented detail with NASA's Transition Region and Coronal Explorer (TRACE) spacecraft. Scientists are interested in the Sun's outer atmosphere, called the corona, because eruptive events occurring in this region can disrupt high-technology systems on Earth. Moreover, studies of the solar corona will help astronomers better understand other stars, which cannot be observed in as fine detail as the Sun. The solar loops are so large that they can span 30 planet Earths.
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