The Sun, in All Its Glory

The Sun does not simply shine.  It roils, and burns, and sends out bursts of light and magnetism and charged particles. A Japanese spacecraft called Hinode has now recorded the Sun’s restlessness in more detail than ever before, and the video is–well, take a look HERE.  NASA, which helped out in the planning, is thrilled.  "For the first time, we are now able to make out tiny granules of hot gas that rise and fall in the sun’s magnetized atmosphere," said Dick Fisher, director of NASA’s Heliophysics Division, in an agency statement.  There’s no one finding from the Hinode mission–it’s the kind of thing that will have scientists filling in details and reworking theories.  More background from NASA is HERE, and a wire story is HERE.  In the meantime, enjoy the pictures.  You don’t need to shield your eyes to see them.