NASA launches IRIS to study how Sun's atmosphere is energized

[Rick]

IRIS Solar Observatory Launches, Begins Mission

NASA's Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) spacecraft launched at 10:27 p.m. EDT Wednesday from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The mission to study the solar atmosphere was placed in orbit by an Orbital Sciences Corporation Pegasus XL rocket. IRIS is a NASA Explorer Mission to observe how solar material moves, gathers energy and heats up as it travels through a little-understood region in the sun's lower atmosphere. This interface region between the sun's photosphere and corona powers its dynamic million-degree atmosphere and drives the solar wind. The interface region also is where most of the sun's ultraviolet emission is generated. These emissions impact the near-Earth space environment and Earth's climate.

More: http://www.nasa.gov/content/iris-solar-observatory-launches-begins-mission/

[Rick]

IRIS Helps Explain Mysterious Heating of the Solar Atmosphere

NASA's newest sun-watcher, the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, launched in 2013 with a specific goal: track how energy and heat coursed through a little understood region of the sun called the interface region. Sandwiched between the solar surface and its outer atmosphere, the corona, the interface region is where the cooler temperatures of the sun's surface transition to the hotter temperatures above. Moreover, all the energy to power the sun's output -- including eruptions such as solar flares and the sun's constant outflow of particles called the solar wind -- must make its way through this region.

Five papers based on IRIS data will highlight different aspects of the energy's journey from the sun's surface through its atmosphere in the Oct. 17, 2014, issue of Science magazine. By looking at various regions of the interface region in unprecedented resolution, the papers offer clues to what heats the corona to unexplained temperatures of millions of degrees, far hotter than the surface of the sun itself, as well as what causes great writhing movement and accelerated particles throughout the solar atmosphere.

More: http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/iris-helps-explain-heating-of-solar-atmosphere/