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Hearing Stay -- The Blue Nile
Super Star
America Online members, astronomically industrious folks that they are, voted on the top ten sun images from SOHO, which is the solar observatory that's in orbit above our planet and takes all those ginchy pictures of our home star every time it has mass coronal ejection or develops a particularly interesting case of sunspots. The story and pictures are here, but here's the number one picture:
You may be saying to yourself, "I don't remember the sun ever looking like that," but what's going on here is that SOHO photographed the sun in three specific frequencies in the ultraviolet range, to look for specific solar features that show up best in that sort of light. The sun, of course, is blasting out radiation at all sorts of energy levels, not merely the relatively narrow band of electromagnetic radiation we see as light and color. So, yes, the sun does look like that, just in light ranges you don't normally see.
Speaking of the sun, and groovy pictures thereof, also check out these photos of this week's total solar eclipse, which you didn't see live unless you were in Antarctica. And if you are in Antarctica, say hi to the penguins for me. Those birds are just the cutest.
Written by johnmscalzi Blog about this entry |
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I was taking an illegal substance one time and the sun looked exactly like that :)
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you are way over my head.
11/25/03 11:37 PM