mirrors and mornings

cwnl:

The Iron Sun

Swirls of red and green represent highly charged iron streaming from the sun’s upper atmosphere, captured by a NASA Goddard Space Flight Center astronomer during a total solar eclipse in 2008.

Ground-based eclipse pictures from 2006, 2008, and 2009 are offering some of the first images of iron-ion emissions from the solar corona. The images show that these emissions extend outward at distances equal to one and a half times the sun’s width. Pictures taken during solar eclipses can help scientists understand the solar corona, which affects potentially dangerous space weather.