Why?
"Reds are relatively cool [...]; blues and greens are hotter [...]."
Seems counter-intuitive a.k.a. the wrong way round. Any special reason for this?
(Saved image, converted to negative, increased Red component -- looks more "convincing"...)
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) has demonstrated its "unprecedented new capability" by firing back some impressive first images of the Sun, including this "full-disk multiwavelength extreme ultraviolet image", captured on 30 March: The SDO's full-disk multiwavelength extreme ultraviolet image of the sun. Pic: NASA …
Well, I guess you'd have to think like an astronomer. Star colour is an indication of its overall temperature. A red star like Antares is cooler in temperature than a yellow star like good ol' Sol, which is cooler than a blue star like Rigel. The further away from red in the visible spectrum, the hotter the star.
I presume that's why the picture has the hot spots in blue and the cooler spots in red.
I've always loved astronomy. :D
...solar images were constant favorites, but the camera was severly degraded by the solar wind.
I have an almost serious theory that the Sun is sentient, and has bets with his star buddies concerning who can make the doofiest life form.
If that is so, we humans can be proud of helping him win.
/me Cracks anothe 211 and watches the show.
Scientists know that red light is low energy, and blue is high energy. If you heat something up it will first glow red, as it gets hotter it will shift towards blue. They are scientists not interior decorators...
Ok, who came up with the conversion... about 60,000 Kelvin, or 107,540 F?
It's ABOUT 60,000 (I expect the original said 6x10^4) you can only say something like ABOUT 100,000 as you don't know the temp to the nearest 10 degrees.
So, 1.5TB equals 500,000 MP3s. Looks to me like NASA are trying to take on El Reg with their quantity definitions. Time to stamp this out, I say!
In which case, what would 1,799,540 F translate to? Slough pub lager temperature? 3 times Paris' crotch temp?? 14 unpronouncable volcano outputs???
We need help, Reg!!
Great to see NASA giving us temperatuers in Fahrenheit and dutifully converting "about a million kelvin" to 1,799,540 F. Six significant figures eh?
A little gem from Wikipedia about Dan Fahrenheit. Zero was the temperature of some mixture of salt and stuff. The other reference point was 96 "the level of the liquid in the thermometer when held in the mouth or under the armpit of his wife". Cool.
I'm not surprised by NASAs non-use of SI units. They probably actually internally used Fahrenheit and converted to Kelvin (6 sig figs becoming approximately 1) purely so that scientists might understand it. I see that they also measure data size using the uncventional "MP3 download" unit.!
Given these conversions, I'm surprised that the picture didn't miss the sun all together, just like Mars...
Maybe the problems with the constellation program were also caused because SI were not used, unlike Apollo ?
(Tounge firmly in cheek)
Red stars are cool, blue stars are hot. Red flames are cool, blue flames are hot. A lower Kelvin setting on your TV or on a light bulb gives a red tint, a higher K is a blue tint.
Look up "black body radiation". Or maybe take a grade-school level physics class.
Crazy picture. Even better will be the neutrino-based images we'll hopefully have soon of the sun. Everything we've seen so far has only been of the surface, but neutrino-detectors will allow us to image the core.
"Beleiving in supernatural beings is just lazy and unimaginitive "
Well, only if your imagination does not stretch beyond an old bearded man in a turban sitting on a cloud with a drawing board, designing each new species of animals by hand.
However, none of your globules would have ever evolved nor there would be anything like the star we are looking at without the laws of nature. But who came up with these laws? Imagine that...
that keeps thumbing down posts that aren't really thumbdown material?
the pic is awesome. red being hotter than blue and green DOES make sense.
if you are religious THATS OK, if someone ridicules it grow a pair and stand up for yourself.
downthumbing is equal to passive aggressive notes on my windscreen pointing out that my car is parked next to some other cars and my neighbour has apparently parked there all his life and really doesn't appreciate my car either existing or being parked on my street, you young ppl with your rock music etc etc.
oh and i thought the post about the sun being sentient was a little funny, not WRONG unlike the phantom anal downthumber seems to think.
if you don't like this post, why don't you thumb it down? that'll really show me. then I'll be sorry.
</rant>