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Sun, Our Sun
Oct 27, 2022
NASA and ESA (European Space Agency) have worked together on multiple missions to advance our understanding of the Sun and its effect on Earth. To continue this collaboration, the two agencies formed the ESA/NASA Lower Thermosphere-Ionosphere Science, or ENLoTIS, working group in May 2022.
Bright swaths of red in the ionosphere, known as airglow, can be seen in this video captured by the International Space Station.
Sun, Our Sun
Dec 14, 2021
For the first time in history, a spacecraft has touched the Sun. NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has now flown through the Sun’s upper atmosphere – the corona – and sampled particles and magnetic fields there.
Image of the sun behind text reading Parker Solar Probe Touches Sun
Sun, Our Sun, Earth’s Space Environment
Nov 24, 2019
The continuously expanding solar wind begins in our Sun and doesn’t stop until after it reaches the edge of the heliosphere.
Effects of the Solar Wind Poster
Sun, Our Sun
Mar 27, 2019
As NASA prepares to send astronauts and spacecraft long distances through space, scientists are keeping an eye on the weather. Space weather.
The Space We Travel Through Poster
Sun, Our Sun
Aug 8, 2018
The Parker Solar Probe will help scientists learn more about the solar wind, an exotic stew of magnetic forces, plasma and particles.
The Parker Solar Probe Poster
Sun, Our Sun
Aug 8, 2018
People around the world look up and see our Sun every day. But through a space telescope, it looks nothing like it does from down on the ground. The surface dances with arches of solar material that reach up into the solar atmosphere – an environment of charged particles and magnetic fields unlike... Read More
The Parker Solar Probe Poster
Sun, Our Sun, Earth’s Space Environment
Jun 27, 2017
High up in the clear blue noontime sky, the sun appears to be much the same day-in, day-out, year after year. But astronomers have long known that this is not true. The sun does change. Properly-filtered telescopes reveal a fiery disk often speckled with dark sunspots. Sunspots are strongly... Read More
Solar Minimum is Coming Poster
Sun, Our Sun, Earth’s Space Environment
Jun 27, 2017
Intense solar activity such as sunspots and solar flares subsides during solar minimum, but that doesn’t mean the sun becomes dull. Solar activity simply changes form.
Solar Minimum is Coming Poster
Sun, Our Sun
Nov 30, 2016
Imagine standing around a roaring campfire, roasting s’mores. You feel the warmth of the flames as the marshmallows crackle. Now back away. You get cooler, right? That's not how it works on the sun. The visible surface of the sun has a temperature of 10,000° F.  Backing away from the inferno... Read More
The Mystery of Coronal Heating Poster 2