FARSIDE SUNSPOT: There's a sunspot on the farside of the sun so large, it is affecting the way the whole sun vibrates. Helioseismic maps reveal the active region about 10 days away from turning toward Earth. This could herald a period of geoeffective solar activity in June. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text
ELLERMAN BOMBS: At the beginning of the week, sunspot AR3315 didn't exist. Now it is the biggest and most dangerous sunspot on the solar disk. Maximilian Teodorescu photographed the fast-growing active region yesterday and found it crackling with bomb-blasts:
These are Ellerman bombs--magnetic explosions about one-millionth as powerful as true solar flares. A handful are circled above for reference. They are named after physicist Ferdinand Ellerman who studied the tiny blasts in the early 20th century. Of course, "tiny" is relative. A single Ellerman bomb releases about 1026 ergs of energy--equal to about 100,000 World War II atomic bombs.
Explosions like these are a sign of magnetic complexity in a sunspot. Opposite polarities bump together, reconnect, and--boom. A full-fledged flare may not be far behind. Solar flare alerts: SMS Text
more images: from Oleksandr A. Veles of Kyiv, Ukraine; from Apollo Lasky of Naperville, IL
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A SUPERNOVA IN LONDON: A week after it exploded in a spiral arm of the Pinwheel Galaxy (M101), new supernova SN 2023ixf has finally peaked in brightness at magnitude +11. Turns out, that's bright enough to see from downtown London. "The supernova was easily visible in my telescope despite the bright lights of the city," reports Terence Murtagh.
"I had great views of the supernova through my EVscope Equinox 2," he says.
SN 2023ixf is a Type II supernova caused by the core collapse of a massive star. A shock wave escaped the dying star on May 19th (Earth time), creating a 15th magnitude fireball first noticed by Koichi Itagaki of Yamagata, Japan.
The expanding fireball has since brightened 40-fold to magnitude +11. That's too dim to see with the unaided eye, but, as Murtagh's photo shows, it is an easy target for backyard telescopes even in urban areas. Take a look!
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FOR FATHER'S DAY--THE MR. SPOCK COFFEE CUP: Father's Day is coming. You can now give dad the gift of coffee in a Mr. Spock Cup. It has pointy ears, holds 20 oz. of brew, and comes from the edge of space. The students of Earth to Sky Calculus flew this cup to the stratosphere onboard a cosmic ray research balloon:
You can have it for $99.95. The students are selling Spock cups to support their cosmic ray ballooning program. Each one comes with greeting card showing the heavy-duty ceramic cup in flight and telling the story of its journey to the stratosphere and back again.
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