Seems like GMU doesn’t stop, waiting for Dave Clarke and John Mashey to launch the next copygate volley. Here’s some interesting research.
FAIRFAX, Va., June 15, 2011—George Mason University scientists discovered recently that a phenomenon called a giant magnetic rope is the cause of solar storms. Confirming the existence of this formation is a key first step in helping to mitigate the adverse effects that solar storm eruptions can have on satellite communications on Earth.
The discovery was made by associate professor Jie Zhang and his graduate student Xin Cheng using images from the NASA Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO) spacecraft.
Though the magnetic rope was believed to be the cause of these giant eruptions on the Sun, scientists had previously not been able to prove this phenomenon existed because of how quickly the rope moves.
However, through close examination of images taken by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly (AIA) telescope on board the SDO, Zhang was able to pinpoint an area of the sun where a magnetic rope was forming. The AIA telescope suite is able to capture images of the Sun every 10 seconds, 24 hours a day. This unprecedented
cadence in time helped the discovery.
“The magnetic rope triggers a solar eruption. Scientists have been debating whether or not this magnetic rope exists before a solar eruption. I believe that the result of this excellent observation helps finally solve this controversial issue,” says Zhang.
A solar storm is a violent eruption from the Sun, sending billions of tons of charged material, also called plasma, into space at a speed of more than one million miles per hour. The cloud of plasma carries with it a strong magnetic field. When the magnetized cloud reaches Earth one to three days later, a huge amount of energy is deposited into the magnetosphere of the Earth.
Normally the Earth’s magnetosphere shields this harmful solar wind and protects the environment. However, a solar storm has the potential to disrupt the shielding effect and produce severe space weather, which can have harmful effects on a wide array of technological systems, including satellite operation, communication and navigation and electric power grids.
Zhang’s research will help in giving early warning about solar storms and help to minimize the damage done by space weather here on Earth.
“Understanding the eruption process of these storms will definitely help us better predict them,” says Zhang. “We cannot prevent solar storms, just like we cannot prevent earthquakes or volcanoes. But the development of prediction capacity can help mitigate adverse effects. For instance, satellite operators can power-down key systems to prevent the possible damage to the systems.”
It is widely believed that magnetic fields in the Sun play an essential role in storing energy and powering solar storms. However, the exact form that magnetic field lines take prior to the eruption are highly controversial. Most field lines are semi-circular loops with their foot-points rooted on the surface of the Sun. They cannot erupt easily, and in fact, they often play the role of preventing the eruption.
Scientists suspected that the magnetic rope, if it indeed existed, was the phenomenon that powered the eruption. A magnetic rope contains many magnetic field lines wrapping around a center axis and possibly twisting around each other. Because of the twisting, a strong electric current can be carried by the magnetic rope. Theoretically, the electric current could produce a sufficient electro-magnetic force to overcome the overlying constraining force from other field lines and power the magnetic rope to move outward.
AIA images now reveal that, before an eruption, there is a long and low-lying channel running through the entire active region, which heats to a temperature as high as 10 million degrees, and slowly rises. When it reaches a critical point, it starts to erupt quickly. It is a feature distinctly different from the surrounding magnetic field lines. This particular hot channel is now believed to be the magnetic rope that scientists have been looking for.
Zhang is an associate professor in the School of Physics, Astronomy and Computational Sciences and works with the Space Weather Lab at George Mason University. His results were reported at the American Astronomical Society Solar Physics Division Meeting, held in Las Cruces, New Mexico on June 12 – 16, 2011.
Image-1: http://spaceweather.gmu.edu/press/Figure_1_SDO_171_Full_Size.png
Video-1: http://spaceweather.gmu.edu/press/Movie_1_SDO_171_Full_Size.avi (44 MB)
Image-2: http://spaceweather.gmu.edu/press/Figure_2_SDO_rope_loop.png
Video-2: http://spaceweather.gmu.edu/press/Movie_2_SDO_rope_loop.avi (80 MB)
Caption: http://spaceweather.gmu.edu/press/caption.txt
(Video and images credit: NASA and George Mason University)
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“We cannot prevent solar storms, just like we cannot prevent earthquakes or volcanoes”
I’d suggest that we’re a lot closer to preventing earthquakes or volcanoes, simply because we’re a lot closer to earthquakes or volcanoes. Might take a while, tho.
Very cool!
Is there a historical database that counts CMEs and direction/ magnitude?
Fiercely interesting stuff. Thanks.
Solar activity other than direct watts/sq meter couldn’t possibly effect our climate. That would undermine AGW.
Wall cloud!
But aren’t the giant magnetic ropes actually caused by terrestrial CO2? (I believe that this has been conclusively proven by Gavin’s advanced GCMs)
Sometimes, interesting good science is just interesting good science, and the snark just gets in the way.
Very cool stuff. Thanks for posting it.
I guess the science involving our understanding of the sun is not “settled”. In fact, is there any area of science where researchers would make such an absurd claim?
Editorial note:
Shouldn’t that be “Seems like GMU doesn’t stop while wating for…”? Seems off as written.
Otherwise… Another fine addition for “Solar Science admits it didn’t know as much as it thought it did” week. Thanks for posting.
I’m a solar scientist and didn’t know it (That image in the post is my wallpaper)
Get them while there hot, I’ll get my coat – http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/main.php
Can the solar magnetic storms be strong enough to reverse the earths magnetic field?
I found this a rather confusing article to read. They talk about twisted ‘ropes’ with current flow, a classical plasma configuration. But then they seem to equate them with ‘field lines’, which don’t exist in physical reality.
What is this “magnetic rope?” It is the result of an electric current or stream of charged particles or plasma. You can’t have a magnetic field in space without moving charge. To say that these spiraling magnetic fields MAY have strong electric currents at the center misses the mark.
What’s the connection with “copygate”? I read it all the way through and didn’t see anything relevant. That was quite a distraction from an otherwise interesting article. Nice to see this discovery is based on actual observations, rather than “experiments” through modeling.
There will be no solar scientist in Italy predicting anything for the forseeable future. Get it wrong go to jail.
Truegold says:
June 15, 2011 at 11:28 am
I guess the science involving our understanding of the sun is not “settled”. In fact, is there any area of science where researchers would make such an absurd claim?
Well, the article says: “Though the magnetic rope was believed to be the cause of these giant eruptions on the Sun, scientists had previously not been able to prove this phenomenon existed because of how quickly the rope moves.” So they just confirm what has been traditional wisdom for many decades.
Kelvin Vaughan says:
June 15, 2011 at 12:00 pm
Can the solar magnetic storms be strong enough to reverse the earths magnetic field?
No, never
tallbloke says:
June 15, 2011 at 12:10 pm
But then they seem to equate them with ‘field lines’, which don’t exist in physical reality.
Yes they do when you deal with a plasma in this sense: charged particles are bound to gyrate around field lines [apparently the particles know where the lines are 🙂 so must react to a physical reality] and particles and lines are tightly tied to each other and move together. Only if the magnetic field extends through a non-conductor [e.g. air or a vacuum] do the field lines lose their ‘individuality’. The field lines are an extremely useful concept and scientists prefer usefulness about all.
Does this phenomenon have any relation to the reduced solar activity that is said to presage a possible repeat of the Maunder Minimum? Would tracking this thing help in predicting?
Not for the firs time science and so called ‘pseudoscience’ are converging. Read more:
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/MF.htm
Bill says:
June 15, 2011 at 12:18 pm
You can’t have a magnetic field in space without moving charge.
Of course you can. The magnetic field from a moving charge extends through space infinitely far away from the charge [unless other fields and charges get in the way]. E.g. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/91/Electromagnetism.svg/175px-Electromagnetism.svg.png
vukcevic says:
June 15, 2011 at 12:57 pm
Not for the first time science and so called ‘pseudoscience’ are converging.
http://people.psych.cornell.edu/~dunning/publications/pdf/unskilledandunaware.pdf
tallbloke says: June 15, 2011 at 12:10 pm
………….
Hi tb
Plasma by its nature is highly layered, this to an observer may appear as a configuration of magnetic lines of force , which of course do not exist, but they are useful theoretical abstraction.
Heheh, I’m getting the popcorn and the beer.
It’s going to be a long night.
Really, really interesting images and videos!
A little help with interpretation?
1. The solar image (Image 1) has a ‘granular’ surface appearance (to my eye). Are these ‘grains’ indicative of convective cells, magnetic cells, or artifacts of the instruments and wavelengths used to acquire the image?
2. Along the ~ 40 degree north latitude line are a series of looped structures over active surface sites (‘sun spots’?). They appear to have both ends of the loop originating at the visible surface. These are ‘magnetic loops’?
3. Immediately adjacent to the loops of the larger ‘sunspot’ (just left and above center) are fan -like sprays of luminescent lines. What are these?
4. The active region highlighted by the white box shows an area without the prominent loops but does show the fainter ‘sprays’ of luminescence. These are referred to as the ‘magnetic ropes’ , in the article. Are these ‘loops’ that have expanded sufficiently that we can no longer see the full loop, giving us the impression of a ‘rope’ with one end detached but really are still part of a continuous loop? I
5. In Video 1, the highlighted area shows the luminescent loops expanding rapidly, yet the remainder of the solar image remains almost immobile. Why is that? Was a video of the highlighted area superimposed over an otherwise static image of the solar surface or are the relative motions of the ‘normal loops’ vs the ‘magnetic ropes’ operating on very different timescales?
Stroke on EKG?
Eminent cardio’s words:
All connects to all.
===========
Sounds like a case for a plasma physicist – and could it be connected to the electric universe?