The Sun bathes the Earth with light rays always, but sometimes events, but not without consequence for humans, occur. The sun continually produces 380 billion billion megawatts (3.826 × 1026 W) and it for billions of years. In one second the Sun releases more energy than all mankind since its birth. Consumption ie the loss of solar mass is 4 million tons of hydrogen per second, because it converts 564 million tons of hydrogen into 560 million tons of helium. How the Sun produces Does this energy? This cauldron makes its energy by nuclear fusion through the enormous pressure and temperature that exist in his heart. If enough gas is heated, electrons are detached from atoms and move freely, material no longer behaves like a gas and was then called plasma. The hydrogen atoms launched against each other by the enormous pressure, will be transformed into helium atoms, this process generates fusion of atoms with a mass slightly smaller and this difference is released as energy. Thousands of explosions shook the magnetic Sun. The Sun's magnetic field has not only two poles, north and south and on land, but between 1 and 10 million. Although maintained by gravity, the plasma was not uniform rotation at the equator solar plasma achieved a revolution every 25 Earth days, while the poles it takes about 35 days. This differential rotation creates magnetic field lines twisted and tangled, which amounted loops prominences in the solar atmosphere. These loops are called plasma flux ropes. When the accumulated energy must be released, the mass of plasma is then propelled into space. When a sunspot magnetic energy it releases its results in a huge explosion of about a billion megatons, the Sun's surface. Solar flares send continuously high energy particles in space and time to time a bubble of superheated plasma radioactive and reaches Earth. When these coronal mass ejections (CME) propelling a huge amount of material are in the direction of the Earth they can cause considerable damage. Fortunately, the planet's magnetic shield protects us in many of these solar storms. These storms can cause electrical currents in the exosphere, the last layer of the atmosphere and turn off the satellites and other electrical infrastructure land. Space weather forecasters sometimes issue alerts when there is a need to sleep some satellites and electrical networks that can get overloaded.
In 1989 part of Quebec, approximately six million people were plunged into darkness due to a solar phenomenon that has damaged transformers. The sun is monitored closely, such as milk on the fire because the Earth is sometimes compromised by its activities. What are sunspots that cause the most severe storms, meteorologists also follow them carefully as they rotate at the solar surface. What is important is to monitor the location and direction of the ejections. As the plasma cannon is not directed towards Earth is not worrisome. The area of all hazards is the center of the Sun facing the Earth rotation. If CME form at the time they can be targeted directly at the planet Earth and hit hard. How do we know that we are affected by solar storms? Solar storms create beautiful colors shimmering around our planet, it is the aurora. The northern excite some elements of our atmosphere and make it shine. Oxygen molecules emit red or green while nitrogen emits pinks, blues and purples. The aurora is confined to the poles but at huge storms, they can go down to the equator. In 1859, the aurora reached Rome. This storm was so intense and perfect alignment so that the planet has received a huge amount of material, it was the perfect solar storm. In our time, a new perfect storm would produce devastating consequences for our technologies would be harmed. We could lose our satellite communications and our power, plunging the planet into chaos. The solar cycle is a periodic phenomenon. It oscillates around a period of 11 years on average with a mix of minimum and maximum activity. At the end of the cycle the polarity of the magnetic field was reversed relative to the end of the previous cycle. The solar magnetic cycle has a period of about 22 years. The most spectacular events in times of intense magnetic activity are the appearance of sunspots and prominences. The number of spots increased gradually during the 11-year cycle, the next maximum would occur in 2012. "When the solar wind pushes the Earth's magnetic field, the effect is huge: there is output voltage of 100,000 volts, currents of 10 million amperes and power up to 1,000 billion watts, Sofko said George, a physicist at the University of Saskatchewan.
* The protrusions are coronal mass ejections (CME). Every second 564 million tons of hydrogen to produce fusion come into 560 million tons of helium, the 4 million tones of waste are converted into energy.
* This photo shows the huge projection made by TESIS, imagine the size of the pons compared to the size of the Earth represented by the little blue dot in the upper right of the image.
The solar activity, eruptive filament
A solar filament remained suspended for over a week above the solar surface prior to erupt. It was filmed by the SDO in the satellite ultraviolet range emitted by helium. The explosion caused a coronal mass ejection (CME) which was dispersed a plasma of high energy through the solar system. The Earth has not crossed the plasma cloud at the time, no aurora has illuminated the sky of our planet. This type of event will recur more frequently in the years ahead as we approach the peak of solar cycle activity.
* A very long filament wound through the solar corona has finally exploded, December 6, 2010. SDO (Solar Dynamics Observatory) NASA filmed the explosion in ultraviolet light from helium. This filament measured almost one million miles long or about half a solar radius. The SDO has had time to film this event before the rotation of the Sun does cache view. The elongated filaments of matter are gas clouds cooled and suspended above the solar surface by magnetic forces. Credit: NASA's GSFC, SDO AIA Team
The random walk of the photon
The energy produced by nuclear fusion is conveyed from the heart of the Sun by light particles called photons and heat. Those are the particles that carry light rays to the Earth. This particle created in the solar core will pass through all layers of the Sun, the radiative zone and the convection zone, the photosphere and finally the solar atmosphere. A photon begins to penetrate the radiative zone of 300 000 km thick, the density is so high that the photon from constantly colliding with other particles such as atoms ionized hydrogen and helium. The increase of the photon is chaotic, it is called by scientists, the photon random walk. The photon is absorbed by atoms and reissued immediately, back and forth is repeated millions of times. As in so far as it goes up to the Sun's surface, the density of matter decreases, there are fewer collisions and interactions, the march is much less chaotic. When there is more than 200 000 km from the surface, the photon enters the convective zone and the pace is accelerating, the photon is pushed outward by the bubbling of the material.
Captivated by huge columns of gas, then it must not only ten days to reach the Sun's surface. The photon emerges gases of the solar atmosphere. Then it takes only 8 minutes to cross the 150 million miles that separates our planet.
* The proton-proton cycle, first merging two protons in a nucleus of deuterium to create a helium nucleus, the portion of the photons are released. The hydrogen atoms launched against each other by the enormous pressure, will be transformed into helium atoms, this process generates fusion of atoms with a mass slightly smaller and this difference is released as energy.
Automatic translation
