Even in the sun, it rains!
The sun also rains heavily like the earth. Sounds a bit strange, doesn’t it? Amidst such a fiery blaze, a rain of pure water! How is that possible? No, this rain does not mean an unbridled torrent coming down from the sky like on earth. That is not even possible. However, the rain that falls on the sun is actually plasma rain.
Scientists have witnessed this cosmic event many times. They have also devised various arguments while trying to find the reason behind this event. This time, two scientists from the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy in America, Jeffrey Ripp and his student Luke Benavidz, have presented new information by breaking those old ideas.
The three states of matter are solid, liquid, and gaseous. Beyond these, there is a fourth state of matter. This is called plasma. Basically, hydrogen and helium gases are ionized under intense heat to form plasma, which forms the outer and inner parts of the sun. The outermost layer of the sun’s atmosphere is called the ‘corona’. It is in this layer that sometimes cold and dense plasma clumps form. Later, the clumps of plasma quickly radiate heat and become heavy and fall to the back of the sun, which looks like large drops of rain. Scientists call this solar rain or ‘coronal rain’.
Until now, scientists believed that the mixture of different substances (iron, oxygen, and hydrogen) in the sun’s atmosphere was actually constant. Each substance has a specific ability to radiate heat. That’s why it takes hours and days for the condensed plasma in the corona to cool down.
Astronomers Ripp and Benavidez have refuted this argument. They claim that it does not take as long for the plasma to cool as previously thought. It cools down within minutes and falls in the form of rain. This solar shower occurs within a few moments of the solar flare, which is a fiery solar flare that is created when energy is released from the Sun’s core into space.
The two astronomers have also explained why and how the plasma cools so quickly. Their research results have been published in the Astrophysical Journal. Like Rip and Benavidez, the mixture of different substances in the sun’s atmosphere is not constant. It is variable. During cosmic events like solar flares, the nature of all these substances changes. Just as iron can absorb heat very quickly, it can also radiate heat quickly. Sometimes the ratio of all these substances can change. Whether the plasma cools quickly or not depends a lot on these conditions.
Rip said, “This research is not just about solar showers. It is much more than that. This research has given us a glimpse of what is going on in the sun’s atmosphere. Not only that, but this research can provide us with a deeper understanding of cosmic events like solar flares, solar storms, or coronal mass ejections in the future, which is very important.”
The solar storms, solar wind and incredibly powerful solar particles that hit the Earth from the Sun actually originate in the Sun’s atmosphere. They are as powerful as the amount of energy generated when a billion or more nuclear bombs explode simultaneously. They are called ‘coronal mass ejections’. They can cause catastrophic events. If these solar storms had hit the Earth directly without any obstacles, life would not have existed here. This did not happen, because the Earth’s magnetosphere blocks this danger. This acts as our planet’s armor. When the invading solar storms, solar wind and solar particles try to enter the Earth’s atmosphere, they have a fierce fight with the magnetosphere. And since this happens most at the two poles of the Earth, we see the light shining. Which is called the aurora or aurora borealis.
But the magnetosphere cannot block everything. After a strong jolt, some storms break through and enter the ionosphere. That danger is not small either. If they get into trouble like that, they can disable the Earth’s telecommunications system. If a plane flying at a very high altitude over the poles encounters a ‘crazy’ solar storm, it can render the plane’s sensors useless. It can cut off all communication between the plane and ground control. As a result, the plane can become disoriented and fall into an accident. It can also disable or completely destroy thousands of artificial satellites orbiting the Earth. It can radically change our space weather.
For all these reasons, scientists are eager to understand the dynamics of such solar storms. But for this, it is necessary to understand the nature of the sun’s atmosphere, that is, the corona. Based on recent research, Rip and Benavidez speculate that this may be somewhat possible.
