![]() So, anyway, the researchers weren’t just looking for some sweet new space sound effects. Or, if electrons spin around a magnetic field. So different sounds are produced by different types of particles doing different things, like, if a beam of electrons streams along a magnetic field. So all the researchers had to do was translate the waves that the probe measured into the types of waves we can hear. Instead, it’s measuring the frequencies and amplitudes of the pressure waves in the solar wind.Īnd that is kind of like sound because here on Earth, we hear pressure waves as sound. There’s no microphone on board the solar probe. Now, this isn’t literally sound, like we think of it on Earth. That’s the whooshing and whistling noises. The other super rad thing we’ve gotten from the Parker Solar Probe are some sound clips. Though the findings aren’t yet conclusive, it’s possible that these magnetic interactions are what’s heating the Sun’s corona and accelerating the solar wind. So far, Parker’s found out that there are dramatic changes in the vibrations of the magnetic fields coming from the Sun, which seem to get weaker as they get farther away. The probe has already made a few laps around the Sun and reported back. How is it so hot? And how does it push the solar wind out at such high speeds? Scientists have suspected that magnetic fields have something to do with it, but they don’t know exactly what. One of the biggest things researchers hope to learn is how the Sun transports energy into the corona in the first place. These winds are what cause auroras on Earth - and on other planets, too. The probe will also take measurements of the hot, electrically charged plasma that comes off of the Sun’s corona and streams through space, called solar wind. Turns out the surface of the Sun is only a few thousand degrees. That’s nuts because the corona is incredibly hot - millions of degrees Fahrenheit. Over the next few years, it’ll swoop around the Sun several more times, getting closer than any spacecraft before it.Īnd it will actually fly through the Sun’s corona, which is the wispy outer layer that’s visible during a solar eclipse. It’s called the Parker Solar Probe, and it’s designed to withstand super-high temperatures. In August 2018, NASA launched a mission to touch the Sun. Luckily, NASA is hard at work answering some of these questions. Like, why is its corona so hot? How does the Sun make solar wind? How does it give Superman his powers? I mean, we know it’s powered by nuclear fusion, that it’s 92.96 million miles away, and that it’s about a million times bigger than the Earth by volume. But there’s more to it than that. You know, for how often we see the Sun, there’s an awful lot we don’t know about it.
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