Solar telescope captures close-up view of the Sun

Solar telescope captures close-up view of the Sun. Today’s Image of the Day from the European Space Agency features a view of the Sun that is closer than any solar telescope has ever been before.

The Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) on ESA’s Solar Orbiter spacecraft captured the remarkable photo, which shows the Sun’s appearance at a wavelength of 17 nanometers.

According to experts at the ESA, images at this wavelength reveal the upper atmosphere of the Sun, the corona, with a temperature of around one million degrees. Solar telescope captures close-up view of the Sun

The Sun is a G-type main-sequence star (G2V) based on its spectral class. As such, it is informally and not completely accurately referred to as a yellow dwarf (its light is closer to white than yellow). It formed approximately 4.6 billion years ago from the gravitational collapse of matter within a region of a large molecular cloud. Most of this matter gathered in the center, whereas the rest flattened into an orbiting disk that became the Solar System. The central mass became so hot and dense that it eventually initiated nuclear fusion in its core. It is thought that almost all stars form by this process.

Image Credit: ESA 

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By Chrissy Sexton, Earth.com Staff Writer