Solar Orbiter’s widest high-res view of the Sun

24 April 2025

Five years into its mission, Solar Orbiter stuns again with this detailed view of the Sun. What you see is the Sun’s million-degree hot atmosphere, called the corona, as it looks in ultraviolet light.  

Dive in and explore the hot plasma (charged particles) caught in the Sun’s messy magnetic field. Can you spot the glowing... read more

Science Nugget: High-Resolution Observations of Clustered Dynamic Extreme-Ultraviolet Bright Tadpoles near the Footpoints of Coronal Loops

23 April 2025

The European Space Agency's (ESA) Solar Orbiter (SolO) [1], launched in February 2020, has ushered in a groundbreaking era of solar observation by capturing high-resolution images from unprecedented proximity to the Sun. On March 26, 2022, SolO reached its perihelion, i.e., the closest approach to the Sun, positioning the spacecraft within... read more

Science Nugget: Bursty acceleration and 3D trajectories of electrons in a solar flare

9 April 2025

Solar flares are the sudden explosion occurring in the sun’s atmosphere due to reconnection of magnetic field lines and emit radiation across the electromagnetic spectrum, from radio end even up to gamma ray frequencies. During the flare, accelerated electrons propagate upwards and downwards from the energy release site along magnetic field... read more

Science Nugget: Picoflare jets in the coronal holes and their link to the solar wind

2 April 2025

Charged particles continuously stream out from the million Kelvin hot corona as the solar wind. High-resolution extreme ultraviolet observations from the Solar Orbiter are providing new insights into the generation process of the solar wind. In particular, high-speed jets are observed to be widespread in darker interiors of coronal holes... read more

Watch wind whirl from the Sun

26 March 2025

Aside from sunlight, the Sun sends out a gusty stream of particles called the solar wind. The ESA-led Solar Orbiter mission is the first to capture on camera this wind flying out from the Sun in a twisting, whirling motion. The solar wind particles spiral outwards as if caught in a cyclone that extends millions of kilometres from the... read more

Science Nugget: Radial dependence of solar energetic particle peak fluxes and fluences

19 March 2025

As the core energy source of the solar system, the Sun continuously supplies energy to interplanetary space through persistent radiative and particle emissions. At the microscopic level, this energy propagates outward in the form of electromagnetic waves and particle streams of varying energies. Among these, Solar Energetic Particles (SEPs),... read more

Science Nugget: Analysis of Solar Eruptions Deflecting in the Low Corona

12 March 2025

Coronal mass ejections (CMEs) are the drivers of the most powerful geomagnetic storms and a major concern in space weather. A reliable prediction of the eruption and its subsequent trajectory is crucial to assess its potential threat to satellites, communication networks, or other systems. Multi-point observations, including Solar... read more

Solar Orbiter spots a solar flare

11 March 2025

A dazzling solar flare was captured by the ESA-led Solar Orbiter mission on 30 September 2024.

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Catch solar bursts in new citizen science project

11 March 2025

Help us uncover the secrets of the Sun! Our Solar Orbiter spacecraft has been watching the Sun since February 2020. With five years’ worth of data waiting to be explored, it’s time to dig in. The new 'Solar Radio Burst Tracker' Zooniverse project is ready for you.

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Science Nugget: Propagation of particles inside a magnetic cloud: Solar Orbiter insights

5 March 2025

Solar energetic particle (SEP) events are sudden bursts of particle intensities linked to solar transient activities [1, 2, 3]. These particles can be released into the solar wind or within interplanetary coronal mass ejections (ICMEs), as a result of impulsive acceleration during flares at the base of the parent ICME or when a newly formed... read more