Thanks to adaptive optics: By far the sharpest images of solar corona taken
Detailed images of the sun's corona have been hampered by turbulence in the Earth's atmosphere. Adaptive optics now make it possible to compensate for this.
A prominence
(Image: Schmidt et al./NJIT/NSO/AURA/NSF)
Thanks to adaptive optics, a research team from the USA has taken the most detailed images of the sun's corona to date and has now published some of them. Several short video sequences show complex structures in constant motion and also "coronal rain", which falls down onto the surface in arcs along magnetic fields. The technology used for this has the potential to revolutionize the study of the corona and could be used at solar observatories around the world. The team is confident that this marks the beginning of a new era in the study of solar physics, with many more discoveries to come.
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As the National Solar Observatory (NSO) explains, research into the sun's corona from the Earth's surface has so far been hampered by turbulence in the Earth's atmosphere. This means that the images could never be really sharp. As in other areas of astronomy, adaptive optics can provide a remedy. In this case, a mirror is used that can compensate for the effects of this turbulence and is deformed 2200 times per second to do so. Such technology has also been used to study the sun, but until now the sharpness achieved with it has stagnated and only structures 1000 km in length could be resolved. The new technology has now increased this to 63 km.
Detaillierteste Aufnahmen der Sonnenkorona (5 Bilder)
Schmidt et al./NJIT/NSO/AURA/NSF
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All the images and video sequences that have now been made public show surreal-looking landscapes on the sun, which is also due to the artificial coloration. However, this is based on the signals that were analyzed for the work. In this case, darker colors also mean greater brightness. The work is presented in a scientific article in the journal Nature Astronomy. Meanwhile, the research team is already working on installing the technology on the world's largest solar telescope. Equipped with this, the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii will be able to make out even finer details, it is certain.
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The impressive images of the sun's corona were published this week just a few days after the highest-resolution photo of sunspots to date was presented. This was taken with a new camera system at the Vacuum Tower Telescope (VTT) of the Observatorio del Teide on Tenerife, explains the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam. Here, too, newly developed technology ensures that the interference from the Earth's atmosphere is compensated for and the theoretically possible resolution of the instrument is achieved. A comparison shows the differences between the photos with and without the new technology.
(Image:Â R. Kamlah et al. 2025)
(mho)
