Solar Wave Clocked at 4.5 Million MPH!!

Scientists utilizing the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) instrument on-board NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), have picked up on quasi-periodic waves in the low solar corona that travel at speeds as high as 2,000 kilometers per second (4.5 million miles per hour).

Just think… We could ride that tasty wave to the Moon and back about 16 times during lunch break and still have time for coffee!

SDO/AIA images of fast waves on 2010 August 1

“It is the high temporal and spatial resolution of AIA that enables us to see these waves clearly for the first time. AIA takes high sensitivity, extreme ultraviolet (EUV) pictures of the solar corona at spatial scales down to 1,100 kilometers, every 12 seconds with 0.1-2 second exposures,” said Dr. Liu, who led the analysis of the waves. “In addition, AIA’s full Sun field of view at seven simultaneous wavelengths allows us to track them over large spatial and temperature ranges.”

Link to Article


This is pretty amazing stuff!

Gnarly barrel dude!

reply to post by Phage


Thanks, Sam. Now i've got the old "Hawaii Five-O" theme on the brain.

Boom-chucka boom-chucka boom,
Duh-duh-da-DA Dahhh-dahhh,
duh-duh-duh Da-duhhh...

Excuse me while I go dig it out with a fork.