News from the Observatory

NSO Press Contact

Evan Pascual

Communications and Public Information Specialist
media@nso.edu

AURA Press Contact

Shari Lifson

Communications Coordinator for AURA
slifson@aura-astronomy.org

The NSF Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope was designed to pave the way for solar coronal magnetometry, the ability to study and measure the magnetic properties of the Sun’s corona. Mapping the corona magnetic fields is an essential function to better understanding the corona and how it drives space weather. Credit: NSF/NSO/AURA

Groundbreaking Achievement: NSF Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope Produces its First Magnetic Field Maps of the Sun’s Corona

Small-scale magnetic structures of the ‘quiet Sun’ at high resolution captured by DKIST

Queen’s University Belfast researchers discover new patterns in Sun’s layers with implications for longstanding solar mystery

Former NSO Director, Steve Keil Passes Away

A mosaic of new solar images produced by the Inouye Solar Telescope was released today, previewing solar data taken during the telescope’s first year of operations during its commissioning phase. Images include sunspots and quiet-Sun features. Credit: NSF/AURA/NSO

New Images Released by NSF’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope

The DKIST Data Center server room is pictured here. The Data Center is responsible for the processes required to manage and maintain the Inouye Solar Telescope’s data throughout its lifecycle, and for the calibration of the raw science data to a Level 1 product, suitable for distribution to the science community. Image credit: NSO/AURA/NSF

NSF’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope Unveils First Publicly Available Datasets

The first images of the chromosphere – the area of the Sun’s atmosphere above the surface – taken with the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope on June 3rd, 2022. The image shows a region 82,500 kilometers across at a resolution of 18 km. This image is taken at 486.13 nanometers using the H-beta line from the Balmer series.

U.S. National Science Foundation Celebrates the Inauguration of its Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope

A newly released high-resolution image of solar sunspots captured by the Inouye Solar Telescope on May 11, 2021 (not from the first science observation). The data leading to this image were acquired with the Visible Broadband Imager blue channel at a wavelength of 450 nanometers.

U.S. NSF’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope Begins Science Operations Commissioning Phase

Dr. Adam Kowalski, joint-faculty & scientist of the National Solar Observatory and University of Colorado, Boulder’s Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, is the 2022 Karen Harvey Prize recipient.

Dr. Adam Kowalski Awarded the 2022 Karen Harvey Prize

The NSF’s National Solar Observatory, headquartered in Boulder, Colorado, announced the receipt of a prestigious Brinson Prize Fellowship from The Brinson Foundation. The NSF’s National Solar Observatory, headquartered in Boulder, Colorado, announced the receipt of a prestigious Brinson Prize Fellowship from The Brinson Foundation. The award will support a postdoctoral scholar for up to three years starting in the fall of 2022. The award’s research brings together the three new solar missions: ESA's Solar Orbiter, upper right, NASA's Parker Solar Probe, center, and NSF’s Inouye Solar Telescope, lower right. Together these three missions will revolutionize our understanding of the Sun’s behavior and its impact on Earth.

National Solar Observatory awarded prestigious Brinson Prize Fellowship

NSF’s National Solar Observatory breaks ground on new telescope site in California

Images of the Sun’s lower atmosphere (left) and magnetic field (right), from GONG, now being processed through NOAA SWPC. Credit: NSO/AURA/NSF with contribution from NOAA

Critical solar observations from NSF’s GONG network now maintained by NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center

21 housing units from the NSF’s National Solar Observatory facility in Sunspot, New Mexico are being donated to White Sands Habitat for Humanity. Each unit is designed to be taken apart and transported on one flatbed trailer.

NSF donates 21 housing units to White Sands Habitat for Humanity

Dr. Thomas Rimmele, Director of NSF’s Inouye Solar Telescope, Named One of Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business. Dr. Rimmele, wearing a yellow safety vest and hard hat, stands in front of the NSF's Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii.

NSO’s Dr. Thomas Rimmele wins SPIE’s Goddard Award in Space and Airborne Optics

The dark, mottled center of a heart-shaped sunspot is surrounded by the streaking, spidery penumbra and the blotchy, cellular granules of the solar surface. The image is colored shades of orange and brow that enhance the images dimensional feel

Inouye Solar Telescope Releases First Image of a Sunspot

A new sunspot peeks around the edge of the Sun, as predicted by NSO scientists

NSF’s National Solar Observatory Predicts a Large Sunspot for Thanksgiving

Sunspot cycle is stabilizing, according to worldwide panel of experts

Artist impression of the Sun using data from NASA and NSO. Astronomers from the NSF's National Solar Observatory will play an important role in endeavors funded by NASA's Heliophysics division to study the feasibility of cutting-edge missions to study the Sun and its connection to Earth. Credit: NSF/NSO/AURA and NASA.

NSO Astronomers to play key role in two new spacecraft mission concept studies

Frank Hill Retires from the NSO

The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope has produced the highest resolution image of the Sun's surface ever taken. In this picture taken at 789nm, we can see features as small as 30km (18 miles) in size for the first time ever. The image shows a pattern of turbulent, “boiling” gas that covers the entire sun. The cell-like structures – each about the size of Texas – are the signature of violent motions that transport heat from the inside of the sun to its surface. Hot solar material (plasma) rises in the bright centers of “cells,” cools off and then sinks below the surface in dark lanes in a process known as convection. In these dark lanes we can also see the tiny, bright markers of magnetic fields. Never before seen to this clarity, these bright specks are thought to channel energy up into the outer layers of the solar atmosphere called the corona. These bright spots may be at the core of why the solar corona is more than a million degrees! The scale of this image is 11.6 km/pix, covering an area of 38,300 x 38,300km (23,800 x 23,800 miles, 50 x 50 arcseconds). Image Use: The images and movies shown here are part of the facility Science Verification Phase. They are for the sole purpose of promotion and are not released for scientific use. Science Verification Phase data is proprietary to the DKIST project, and its use for publications or outreach purposes requires approval by the NSO Director, and notification to the cognizant NSF program officer. Please contact outreach@nso.edu for details and questions. The original data are still being processed and are not fully calibrated for scientific use. Images have been processed to remove noise and enhance the visibility (contrast) of small-scale (magnetic) features while maintaining their shape. The movie frames have been smoothed to remove noise. For full image use policies please visit https://nso.edu/about/image-use-policy/

Telescopio Solar de la Fundación de Ciencias de EEUU produce sus primeras imágenes

The Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope has produced the highest resolution image of the Sun's surface ever taken. In this picture taken at 789nm, we can see features as small as 30km (18 miles) in size for the first time ever. The image shows a pattern of turbulent, “boiling” gas that covers the entire sun. The cell-like structures – each about the size of Texas – are the signature of violent motions that transport heat from the inside of the sun to its surface. Hot solar material (plasma) rises in the bright centers of “cells,” cools off and then sinks below the surface in dark lanes in a process known as convection. In these dark lanes we can also see the tiny, bright markers of magnetic fields. Never before seen to this clarity, these bright specks are thought to channel energy up into the outer layers of the solar atmosphere called the corona. These bright spots may be at the core of why the solar corona is more than a million degrees! Image Use: The images and movies shown here are part of the facility Science Verification Phase. They are for the sole purpose of promotion and are not released for scientific use. Science Verification Phase data is proprietary to the DKIST project, and its use for publications or outreach purposes requires approval by the NSO Director, and notification to the cognizant NSF program officer. Please contact outreach@nso.edu for details and questions. The original data are still being processed and are not fully calibrated for scientific use. Images have been processed to remove noise and enhance the visibility (contrast) of small-scale (magnetic) features while maintaining their shape. The movie frames have been smoothed to remove noise. For full image use policies please visit https://nso.edu/about/image-use-policy/ Credit: NSO/AURA/NSF

NSF’s newest solar telescope produces first images

Measuring the magnetic field of the solar corona is one of many transformative observations DKIST will bring. This composite image shows the Sun’s magnetic field at its surface, and hot plasma tracing magnetic field lines in the corona.

National Solar Observatory molding the future of solar physics research thanks to new NSF funding

A nine-hour exposure of the McMath-Pierce Solar Facility on Kitt Peak. The normally white building appears red due to high altitude haze following the 1991 eruptions of Mount Pinatubo. No filters or multiple exposures were used

National Science Foundation to Fund New Windows on the Universe Center for Astronomy Outreach at Kitt Peak National Observatory

First Taste of Citizen Science Video Capturing Entire U.S. Transit of Solar Eclipse

National Solar Observatory Predicts Shape of Solar Corona for August Eclipse

NSF to fund a nationwide effort to capture the eclipse

The Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Opics system at the New Solar Telescope of the Big Bear Solar Observatory uses three sequential deformable mirrors, changing shape one thousand times a second, to correct the incoming light from the Sun creating a clearer image (as seen to the right),

Next generation of adaptive optics widens the field for observations of the Sun

The DKIST Construction Team

National Solar Observatory’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope On Track to Provide Ground-Breaking Observations of the Sun

NSO Headquarters is in a redbrick, L-shaped, 3 story building that is offset against the vivid blue Boulder sky.

National Solar Observatory celebrates relocation to Boulder, CO

Image taken during Mercury 2006 transit observed at NSO’s Dunn Solar Telescope, Sacramento Peak, New Mexico. Black disk is the projection of Mercury against solar chromosphere (in background).

NSO Prepares for Mercury Transit

Students of Ms. Jessica Reed's Earth and Space Science class at Maui Waena Intermediate School view the sun through the NSO Maui Eclipse glasses, along with Dr. Tom Schad of the NSO. (Photo Credit: Jessica Reed)

Maui Views March 8th partial solar eclipse

the CLASP team with Principal Investigators Dr. Amy Winebarger (NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, USA), Dr. R. Kano (National Astronomical Observatory of Japan), Dr. Fréderic Auchere (Institut d'Astrophysique Spatiale, France), and Dr. Javier Trujillo Bueno (Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Spain), among the launch support team in front of the CLASP on top of the NASA Black Brant IX suborbital sounding rocket at White Sands Missile Range.

Successful CLASP rocket flight supported by DST observations

Images of the Sun at the peak time of bright flare emission. Both images are taken with red light of hydrogen but showing different altitudes above the Sun’s surface.

Ground-based Telescopes Observe Largest Solar Flare of 2014

Left to right: Jennifer Sabas, Dr. William Smith (AURA), Mrs. Irene Hirano Inouye, Dr. David Lassner (UH), Dr. James Ulvestad (NSF), Dr Valentin Martinez Pillet (NSO).

Solar Telescope Named for Late Senator Inouye

SOLIS instruments at the National Solar Observatory at Kitt Peak

SOLIS Observations Give New Insights into Space Weather

Scientists Discover Solar Precursors of Where, When Sunspots will Emerge

AURA Announces the Selection of Dr. Valentin Pillet as National Solar Observatory Director

First High-Resolution H-Beta Solar Image

SOLIS magnetograms are used to predict shape of corona for total solar eclipse

Lights, camera, CME!: Images from the GONG station at Udaipur, India, captured the quick evolution of a coronal mass ejection from the Sun. The movie was taken in H-alpha, a deep red color (656.3nm) used to track solar active regions (human vision spans about 350–770nm, from violet to red). The movies are available in medium (808KB) or large (874x936-pixel, 6.6MB file) formats. The original also is available at the GONG site.

NSO Data Used to Forecast January’s Major Geomagnetic Storm

Spectral lines are the unique "fingerprints in light" that all atoms and molecules produce. In the presence of a magnetic field in a hot gas, some lines split, betraying the presence and strength of the magnetic fields. Each line corresponds to electrons giving up energy in discrete amounts, or quanta, as light. Imposing a magnetic field on the atom makes the electrons produce multiple lines instead of one. The spread of these lines is a direct measure of the strength of the magnetic field, and is greater in the red and then the infrared spectrum. This image depicts sunspot spectra taken by FIRS with lines centered at 630.2nm (left) and 1564.8nm (right). Note the broadened area in the color ellipses, indicating line splitting inside a spot, and how the broadening is greater at the longer wavelength. Contrast is adjusted to enhance visibility in the inset boxes. (Links to larger image. Source: IfA, UH)

“Cool” Gas May Form and Strengthen Sunspots

Views of the FTS show it with the vacuum chamber open for removal of the granite optics bench

Colorful Solar Instrument Treks East for a New Career

A GONG magnetogram of the Sun from April 23, 2003. No. 3 of the four active regions is highlighted here by Flarecast. The top right image shows the magnetic gradient contours for north (red) and south (blue) polarity. The yellow lines in the second image show the SPILs (strong-gradient polarity inversion lines), which would trace between the red and blue contours. This area was AR 10338, which produced an M5.1 flare and then three smaller C-class flares that day. The orange dot represents the size of Earth. (From Steward et al)

Magnetic “Topography” Helps Predict Solar Flares

NSO Names Key Managers

Not much happening? This "quiet" area (right) gave birth to the March 2, 2011 CME. It is shown at bottom in ultraviolet (19.3nm) by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, H-alpha (656.3nm) by the Big Bear Solar Observatory, and as a magnetographic map, also by SDO. In the last, white is north (positive) polarity, black is south (negative) polarity, and gray is where the structure is so fine that the signals wash together. Credit: NASA, NJIT/BBSO.

Hunting the Source of “Stealth” Solar Storms

Dr. Stephen Keil Announces the End of his Term as NSO Director

NSO Headquarters Chosen

What’s Down with the Sun? Major Drop in Solar Activity Predicted

A composite of 9 still frames from OSPAN in H-alpha (656.3 nm) shows a tsunami-like wave spreading from a white-light flare erupting from AR 10930. Numbers indicate the date and time in Universal Time. Note that the brightness and contrast have been enhanced to bring up details of the tsunami.

Telescope spots solar tsunami

NSO Response to the NSF Senior Review

Berst, Fletcher, and Komsa received the NSO technical innovation award for their outstanding work in developing a Virtual Camera System (VCS) for the Dunn Solar Telescope.

Virtual Camera Offers Flexibility for Solar Observers

An equator-to-south pole subsection of the Sun on July 23, 2006 shows the location and polarity of magnetic fields as light and dark patches. White indicates polarity rising out of the solar surface, and black indicates polarity into the surface. An eruption of the new cycle is labeled in the lower, high latitude part of the image, and a current cycle low latitude eruption is labeled at the top. Notice the reversed east-west orientation of the eruptions. Magnetic patterns in the northern hemisphere will be reversed, i.e., black-white near the equator for the current cycle and white-black near the poles for the new cycle.

Onset of Next Solar Activity Cycle Observed

The lower atmosphere of Venus as seen by the Near-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (NIMS) instrument carried by the Galileo spacecraft. These images were taken in 1991 as Galileo flew past Venus in a complex series of gravity-assist maneuvers to rehape its trajectory outward to Jupiter. (JPL & NASA)

Peeking Behind the Veil of Venus

Richard Dunn

Dr. Richard B. Dunn Passes Away

High-resolution image of sunspot produced with the new camera attached to the Dunn's adaptive optics system.

Adaptive Optics Produces Ultrasharp Images of Sunspot

KeithPierce

Dr. A. Keith Pierce Passes Away

Haleakalā, HI, Endorsed for the Inouye Solar Telescope

Virtual Solar Observatory now available for “one-stop data shopping”

Haleakalā, HI, recommended for the Advanced Technology Solar Telescope

“Think Big” is Plan at Solar Physics Conference

Map of candidate sites -- in Hawaii, California, and the Canary Islands -- being surveyed for the Advanced Technology Solar Telescope (ATST).

Site Survey for World’s Largest Optical Solar Telescope Passes Midpoint

Artist's concept depicts the new single-level coude lab that will sit in the base of the ATST observatory. Despite the loss of one level, the coude lab will provide eight instrument positions on hardened pads, the same as in the prior design. The expanded louvers provide up to 2.5 times as much air flow as the previous design.

ATST Design Update

A sequence of images taken with the NJIT near-infrared camera shows the Oct. 29, 2003, X10 flare from 20:40 to 20:47 UT. Red shows local near-infrared intensity maxima. Blue outlines the hard X-ray emissions observed by the Ramaty High-Energy Solar Spectral Imager (RHESSI) spacecraft. Two flare ribbons correlate with the strong HXR kernels. Hard X-ray contours are shown at 0.7 and 0.8 of maximum intensity in frame 1 and 0.4, 0.6, and 0.8 in frame 2, and then at 0.17, 0.25, 0.60, and 0.80 in frames 3 through 8 where the HXR kernels were stronger.

Infrared Camera Peeks Below the Visible Surface of the Sun

With a time series of speckle masking reconstructed high resolution images, like the preceding picture, we can follow the features on the surface of the sun and make flow map of the solar active region 10486. This figure shows the direction of the flow field using different colors. The color bar in the picture shows the correspondence between the colors and the direction of the flow. The yellow line in the image shows the magnetic neutral line in the region. One interesting thing we found is that there are neighboring regions with flows of totally different direction. We are investigating if this has anything to do with an X-10 flare happened about 4 hours later in the same active region.

Combined Optical Techniques Confirm Magnetic Shear in Sunspot Motion

Sample images by the DLSP. Each works with the Stokes profiles based on intensity of light in different polarization aspects -- circular and linear, plus simple intensity without polarization -- to deduce the intensity and direction of a magnetic field. The intensity maps at left were taken along the vertical slit in the lower left corner of the sunspot image at right (the two horizontal lines are for alignment). Scanning the slit across the field of view builds the maps shown at right.

New Instrument Makes Highest-Resolution Magnetic Measurements Inside a Sunspot

H-alpha image of a flare. The small sunspot observed here close to the limb on Oct. 24 was part of the big active region that produced the X17.2 flare on Oct. 28. The sequence shows a super-penumbral loop system erupt. It appears that the foot points of the loops as well as some loop tops became bright during the flare. The data indicate that the flare was triggered by new flux emerging in the lower right corner of the image. Tick marks are 1 arc-sec. Structure on spatial scales of 0".2 arsec is visible in this image.

New Eyes on Old Telescope Provide Insight into Solar Storm

Modern Solar Telescope Network’s View of Venus Passage Will Help Students Use Web to Recall Historical Era

Scientists to plan International Heliophysical Year

H-alpha image of a flare. The small sunspot observed here close to the limb on Oct. 24 was part of the big active region that produced the X17.2 flare on Oct. 28. The sequence shows a super-penumbral loop system erupt. It appears that the foot points of the loops as well as some loop tops became bright during the flare. The data indicate that the flare was triggered by new flux emerging in the lower right corner of the image. Tick marks are 1 arc-sec. Structure on spatial scales of 0".2 arsec is visible in this image..

Peering into the Heart of a Storm

Three Sites Selected as Candidates for World’s Largest Solar Telescope

ATST Interim Site Survey Report Released

This image of the Sun was taken by ISOON on Oct. 14, 2003. The left image is in red continuum light, centered at 630.315, to show features in the photosphere, the visible surface, that also appear in white light. The image at right was taken in hydrogen-alpha (H-alpha) at 653.281 nm. It shows active regions in the chromosphere, the hotter atmosphere above the surface. The dark bands are filaments, ribbons of cool gas at high altitude, that also would show as prominences at the Sun's limb (such as the right edge of this image). The white areas are plages (French for beach), slightly active areas.

Sun acts up on its way to a quiet time

Two major sunspot groups appear on the Sun in this image taken about 8 a.m., Friday, October 24, 2003 from the NSO's McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope on Kitt Peak near Tucson, Arizona.

Two Major Sunspot Regions Viewed from Kitt Peak, AZ

Smoothing Out the Wrinkles in our View of the Sun

Sun Remains Active Late in 11-year Cycle

GONG Observes the Transit of Mercury

Modern solar telescope network’s view of Mercury passage will help students use web to recall historical era

Sun offers Halloween “trick or treat”

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