It’s a first. Never has the sun been immortalized with such a level of precision. These unique images, published Wednesday by National Solar Observatory (United States National Solar Observatory), we owe them to Daniel K. Inouye. In other words, the largest telescope ever built.
Unraveling the mystery of the solar system
To immortalize this astral view, the device was installed at the top of the Haleakalā volcano in Hawaii, at an altitude of 3000 meters. The image was captured over ten minutes.
With its ultra-powerful cooling system, the telescope could then withstand significant amounts of heat, up to 6000 ° C, reports the British daily The Guardian.
Source: NSOK
“To unravel the greatest mysteries of the Sun, we must not only be able to clearly see these tiny structures 150 million kilometers away, but also to accurately measure the strength and direction of their magnetic field near the surface”, explains Thomas Rimmele, director of the Solar Telescope, in a press release.
Cells 1600 km in diameter
Difficult to imagine that this granulated and golden surface represents convection cells of the solar plasma that can measure up to 1600 km in diameter. “Or the size of the state of Texas,” compares BFTM.
To unravel the greatest mysteries of the Sun, we must be able to clearly see these tiny structures 150 million kilometers apart.
Thomas rimmele, director of the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope
According to the French popular science magazine Sciences and Future, “On the scale of this gigantic gas ball, such a resolution is of the order of technical prowess.”
No scientific purposes
In its press release, the NSO specifies however that these images are not disseminated for scientific purposes. The telescope will still have to be tested for the next six months before it is officially commissioned.
The objective being, during the next five years, to collect the maximum of data on our nearest star.
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