The Halloween spirit seems to have spread all the way into space, after NASA shared a photo of the sun looking like a Jack- O’-Lantern.
NASA posted the image to their Sun Science Facebook page.
NASA Sun Science looks at how the sun affects space around Earth and other worlds.
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There are currently 17 missions investigating the sun in a field of research known as heliophysics.
The image was shared in celebration of Halloween.
NASA wrote alongside the image:
“Even our star celebrates the spooky season — in 2014, active regions on the Sun created this jack-o’-lantern face, as seen in ultraviolet light by our Solar Dynamics Observatory satellite.”
NASA described what caused the face to appear.
In a description on their website, NASA explained:
“The active regions in this image appear brighter because those are areas that emit more light and energy. They are markers of an intense and complex set of magnetic fields hovering in the sun’s atmosphere, the corona.
“This image blends together two sets of extreme ultraviolet wavelengths at 171 and 193 Ångströms, typically colorized in gold and yellow, to create a particularly Halloween-like appearance.”
The image has since gone viral.
The Jack-o’-Lantern sun has received over 20,000 likes since NASA shared it.
The image received a lot of praise from people, with lots of people also commenting that the face looks like something out of Doctor Who .
You can download the image from NASA’s website.
NASA offered up a free-to-download high-resolution version of the image so that everyone can share in the Halloween spirit.
The Solar Dynamics Observatory satellite that captured the image is still in use, and is still monitoring our sun from space. Hopefully, it will catch more amazing images like these ones in the future!
h/t: NASA
Last Updated on October 29, 2019 by Paddy Clarke
