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| SOHO shows First Signs of Ageing |
| The ESA/NASA SOHO spacecraft, launched in 1995, has been delivering outstanding data about the Sun for over eight years. Recently, however, an anomaly on the pointing mechanism of its high-gain antenna has been recorded. |
| Date: 20 Jun 2003 |
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| SOHO's solar wind of change |
| We have known for 40 years that space weather affects the Earth, which is buffeted by a 'wind' from the Sun, but only now are we learning more about its precise origins. Solving the mystery of the solar wind has been a prime task for ESA's SOHO spacecraft. Its latest findings, announced on 20 May 2003, may overturn previous ideas about the origin of the 'fast' solar wind, which occurs in most of the space around the Sun. |
| Date: 21 May 2003 |
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| Mercury shows its dark side |
| During the morning of 7 May 2003, the planet Mercury will slip across the face of the Sun in a rare event, known as a transit. There are only about 12 celestial alignments like this every century and you cannot view them safely without special telescopic equipment. So, let the ESA/NASA solar watchdog, SOHO, do all the hard work for you... |
| Date: 01 May 2003 |
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| ESA PR 10-2003 ESA chairs the International Living With a Star programme |
| ESA is providing the first chairman for the International Living With A Star (ILWS) programme. ILWS is an unprecedented initiative in which space agencies worldwide are getting together to investigate how variations in the Sun affect the environment of Earth and the other planets, in the short and long term. |
| Date: 20 Feb 2003 |
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| Bright comet is really NEAT |
| Comet C/2002 V1 (NEAT) is putting on a fine show for ESA/NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) space probe. As the comet swings closer to the Sun, it has got brighter. Now it is the brightest comet ever observed by SOHO's LASCO instrument. |
| Date: 19 Feb 2003 |
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| Follow Comet C/2002 V1 (NEAT) with SOHO |
| Only the most dedicated of sky watchers will have seen the latest comet, called C/2002 V1 (NEAT). It has hovered near the limits of naked-eye visibility in the evening sky since January 2003. However, you would need a pair of binoculars, pointed in exactly the right direction, to see anything. Log onto the Internet instead, and let the ESA/NASA space probe SOHO show you more about this comet than you would usually see. |
| Date: 12 Feb 2003 |
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| Our Sun does the wave |
| Our Sun has large features that move across its surface as it rotates. Scientists call them 'supergranules'. Thanks to data from the SOHO spacecraft, scientists believe they have found out why supergranules move faster than the Sun rotates. They do not move faster at all. The apparent rapid rotation is an illusion generated by a pattern of waves, like spectators doing the wave at a sporting event. |
| Date: 06 Jan 2003 |
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| SOHO and the 2002 total eclipse |
| On 4 December 2002, the Moon will pass in front of our Sun, giving us a total solar eclipse. A solar eclipse occurs when the Moon comes between the Sun and the observer. This happens when the shadow cone of the Moon intersects the surface of the Earth, and is observable by anyone within this shadow zone. |
| Date: 04 Dec 2002 |
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| SOHO discovers 500th new comet |
| On Monday 12 August 2002, about 16:05 UT, ESA's SOHO spacecraft spotted its 500th comet as the comet passed close to the Sun.
It seems a little strange that SOHO, designed to examine the Sun, should turn out to be the most productive comet finder in the history of astronomy, and by a very wide margin. We interviewed ESA's project scientist for SOHO, Bernhard Fleck, about that.
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| Date: 15 Aug 2002 |
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| Starquakes reveal stellar secrets |
| Looking into the interior of the Earth or the Sun is a bit similar to examining a baby in its mother's womb using an ultrasound scan. Light cannot penetrate the area, so we make pictures in these cases using sound waves, which human ears cannot hear. With SOHO, ESA has probed deeply into the Sun using the sound-waves principle, and with great success. The future missions, Solar Orbiter and Eddington, will look inside our Sun and other stars, respectively, in a similar way. |
| Date: 14 Aug 2002 |
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| Violent days on the Sun |
| On Tuesday 23 July 2002 space scientists recorded the largest of four powerful solar flares, all occurring in the space of just eight days.
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| Date: 26 Jul 2002 |
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| Solar loops spring into view |
| Huge loops of very hot gas rising above the Sun's surface vibrate with enormous energy at times of solar storms. This is the latest surprise from ESA's flotilla of spacecraft - SOHO, Ulysses and the four Cluster satellites - with which scientists are trying to make sense of how disturbances on the Sun affect the Earth. |
| Date: 13 Jun 2002 |
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| Unusual views of the Sun |
| For centuries, we have worshipped it and wondered at it, but it's only now that we are getting a really good look at it. Although you can't gaze at the Sun with the naked eye, thanks to modern science we can view images of our nearest star that confirm the fiery glory our ancestors could only imagine. |
| Date: 21 May 2002 |
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| Winds of 320 000 kilometres per hour on the Sun |
| The SUMER instrument on the ESA-NASA SOHO spacecraft has measured amazing wind speeds during its observations of the Sun. It sets a new record in its examination of two loops of gas arching in the solar atmosphere, where NASA's TRACE satellite spotted bright blobs of gas. Shifts in the wavelength of ultraviolet light from highly ionized neon atoms, seen by SUMER, revealed steady wind speeds of up to 320 000 kilometres per hour. That's fast enough to cross the Atlantic Ocean in less than a minute. |
| Date: 16 May 2002 |
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| SOHO comet spotting competition |
Guess when a comet will be spotted to win a SOLARMAX DVD
ESA's solar satellite, SOHO, has become the best comet spotter the world has ever known. When SOHO's latest solar images are posted on the Internet, astronomers and space enthusiasts alike are thrilled when they spot evidence of new comets that have never been seen before as they pass close to the Sun. Since SOHO's launch in 1995, 435 new comets have been discovered. And, in the very near future, the 500th new comet will be found. |
| Date: 10 May 2002 |
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| In SOHO's pictures, watch a comet passing near the Sun |
| Between now and Saturday, 20 April, you can follow via the Internet the progress of the new-found Comet SOHO-422. Usually, comets seen by the SOHO spacecraft quickly burn up in the Sun's hot atmosphere. This one won't, so there is still time to monitor its progress. |
| Date: 17 Apr 2002 |
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| SOHO's private view of a sunbathing comet |
| You could see it easily with your unaided eye (but don't try!) if only Comet
Machholz 1 were not so very close to the Sun. This unusual comet, reputed to flare up a lot, is
today sweltering only 18 million kilometres from the Sun. This is its closest approach on an
orbit that brings it back to the solar vicinity every 63 months. The best and perhaps the only
view of it at this time comes from the ESA-NASA sunwatching spacecraft SOHO.
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| Date: 08 Jan 2002 |
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| SOHO sees dazzling eruption from the Sun |
| The New Year got off to a striking start for scientists at SOHO's operations centre who were treated to a dazzling display from the Sun on 4 January. Images of an unusually beautiful ejection of solar material were captured by several instruments on the ESA-NASA spacecraft. |
| Date: 07 Jan 2002 |
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| New twists to the inside story of the Sun |
| At a conference in San Francisco last night, scientists using the ESA-NASA SOHO spacecraft to probe the solar interior reported surprising new details about what goes on beneath the dark sunspots that blemish the Sun's bright face. What was previously thought to be a single broad tube of hot, strongly magnetized gas, rising towards the surface beneath a spot, turns out on closer examination to be many smaller magnetic structures that rise quickly from deep within the Sun. |
| Date: 11 Dec 2001 |
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| SOHO's latest surprise: gas near the Sun heading the wrong way |
| Mysterious clouds of gas falling towards the Sun have been spotted with the ESA-NASA SOHO spacecraft. They go against the fast-moving streams of gas that pour out continuously into space, in the solar wind. In today's issue of Astrophysical Journal Letters, the scientists who found them suggest that the inflows are due to frequent local adjustments to the Sun's magnetic field. The discovery promises a better understanding of the sources of the solar magnetism that envelops the Earth, quarrels with our own planet's field, and to some extent protects us from cosmic rays coming from the stars. |
| Date: 20 Nov 2001 |
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