Sandrine Ceurstemont, editor, New Scientist TV
Tornadoes on Earth can't compare with massive, superhot twisters on the sun. Now you can see what a tornado several times as wide as the Earth looks like as it whirls gas into the sun's atmosphere for several hours, thanks to a movie captured by a telescope on NASA's Solar Dynamic Observatory (SDO) satellite on September 25, 2011.
The video shows gas particles observed at three different temperatures during the event. The temperature of this twister is high compared to smaller ones and physicist Xing Li, from Aberystwyth University in the UK, and his team are currently investigating why.
Solar tornadoes are thought to be caused by a structure rooted at both ends of the sun's surface that resembles a magnetic slinky. "A huge injection of material shoots up one of the legs of the slinky and is forced to follow the helical shape of the magnetic field," says Li. "When you observe the slinky from one end, you see a coherent rotation of material around a central axis."
The twirling motion of these tornadoes could help trigger coronal mass ejections - blasts of charged particles that can affect space weather or zap satellites if directed towards the Earth. Two of these eruptions were detected right above the tornado in this video as it started to form, so it may have been involved in setting off the explosion.
Li and his team expect to observe more of these tornadoes soon since the sun is currently in a highly active state. The video is being presented today at the National Astronomy Meeting in Manchester, UK.
If you enjoyed this post, check out a monster blast on the sun's surface or watch a recent explanation for space weather.
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