NASA's Parker Solar Probe spacecraft , which is in space studying the Sun , passed through a huge solar explosion, known as a coronal mass ejection (CME), and managed to emerge unscathed, even sending an impressive video back to Earth.
Scientists recently released rare footage of this solar event. Coronal mass ejections are explosions of a mass of super-hot gas, known as plasma. “ It’s like picking up a piece of the sun and shooting it into space ,” Mark Miesch , a scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Space Weather Prediction Center, told Mashable
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The coronal mass ejection recorded by NASAoccurred in September 2022 and was "one of the most powerful ever recorded," according to the space agency. Parker Solar Probe managed to pass through the explosion unscathed, as it is equipped with a powerful heat shieldto withstand such intense bursts of radiation.
In the released video, the sun itself is not visible but is on the left of the screen. At 14 seconds, a coronal mass ejection becomes visible, shooting plasma from left to right. The spacecraft passes through the explosion and emerges at the end of the video.
This was no small feat. “In total, Parker spent about two days observing the CME, becoming the first spacecraft ever to fly through a powerful solar flare near the sun,” the Johns Hopkins laboratory explained.
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Scientists are using observations from Parker Solar Probe and other spacecraft and telescopes to better understand the behavior of potentially destructive CMEs and other phenomena, such as solar storms. CMEs, for example, “can endanger satellites, disrupt communications and technologies , and even knock out power grids on Earth,” NASA explains.
In the coming years, observations from Parker Solar Probe may help researchers better predict where a coronal mass ejection could strike, allowing a region to better prepare (for example, by temporarily shutting down the power grid).
For now, the Parker Solar Probe mission is still underway. In 2024, the spacecraft will reach a distance of 3.9 million miles from the Sun to better observe it.
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Parker Solar Probe is a historic NASA mission designed to explore the Sun up close, revealing its secrets. The spacecraft, named for astrophysicist Eugene Parker, is designed to withstand the extreme conditions of the solar system as it approaches closer to the Sun than any other spacecraft. Through Parker Solar Probe missions, scientists expect to gain a better understanding of the nature and behavior of the Sun, with the goal of protecting life and technology on Earth.
Source: mashable.com
