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Unusual magnetic changes in the Sun – The north pole of the Sun had started flipping about a year earlier than expected

unusual-magnetic-changes-in-the-sun-the-north-pole-of-the-sun-had-started-flipping-about-a-year-earlier-than-expected

While scientists had predicted that the next flip would begin from May 2013, the solar observation satellite Hinode found that the north pole of the sun had started flipping about a year earlier than expected. There was no noticeable change in the south pole.

The researchers found signs of unusual magnetic changes in the sun. Normally, the sun’s magnetic field flips about once every 11 years. In 2001, the sun’s magnetic north pole, which was in the northern hemisphere, flipped to the south. If that trend continues, magnetic field polarity at the solar poles will reverse and become quadrupolar in May, meaning positive fields will emerge in the North and South poles and negative fields will emerge on the equator, according to the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and other institutes. A research team led by Saku Tsuneta, a professor at the observatory, analyzed solar magnetic fields data using Hinode, an observational satellite, and confirmed that the polarity of the magnetic field at the North Pole began to reverse in July last year.

The research team believes the quadrupolar pattern also emerged in the 17th to 18th century. The Japanese study found that the trend of current sunspot activity is similar to records from Maunder Minimum, period about 300 years ago when temperatures are estimated to have been about 2.5 degrees lower than in the second half of the 20th century. Officials of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and the Riken research foundation said on April 19 that the activity of sunspots appeared to resemble a 70-year period in the 17th century in which London’s Thames froze over and cherry blossoms bloomed later than usual in Kyoto.

The Sun’s Poles

Like Earth, the Sun has a North Pole, a South Pole, and an equator. The poles of the Sun are different in several ways from the areas near the Sun’s equator. About every 11 years, the Sun’s magnetic poles flip – North becomes South and vice versa. This flip happens around the peak of the sunspot cycle, when there are lots of sunspots. Earth’s magnetic poles sometimes flip, too. However, it is usually many thousands or even millions of years between flips of Earth’s field – not just 11 years! The last polar reversal occurred around 750,000 years ago, but it can happen at shorter intervals, depending on prevailing circumstances.  Some researchers think our planet is overdue for another one, but nobody knows exactly when the next reversal might occur. Many scientists, including Einstein, have predicted that another polar shift is close at hand.  Several ancient civilisations have left records predicting global devastation and change.  The Hopi Indian and Mayan calendars have predicted global devastation and an era of change starting in the year 2012.

The ongoing changes are not confined to the space immediately around our star, Hathaway added. The Sun’s magnetic field envelops the entire solar system in a bubble that scientists call the “heliosphere.” The heliosphere extends 50 to 100 astronomical units (AU) beyond the orbit of Pluto. Inside it is the solar system – outside is interstellar space.

Sunspots are places on the “surface” of the Sun where the magnetic field is much, much stronger than normal. Sunspots only appear near the Sun’s equator, between about 40° North and 40° South latitude. Sunspots never appear near the Sun’s poles. Some parts of the Sun rotate more slowly than other parts. At the equator, the Sun spins pretty fast. It takes 25 days to turn all the way around. It turns more slowly at the poles. The poles take 34 days to spin around once. The Sun’s atmosphere at the poles is also different from the atmosphere above the Sun’s equator. The corona, part of the Sun’s atmosphere, sticks out further from the Sun’s surface near the equator. The corona doesn’t stick out as far above the poles. The solar wind is also different at the poles. It “blows” much faster above the poles than it does above the Sun’s equator.

The Sun’s magnetic field

The Sun has a very large and very complex magnetic field. The magnetic field at an average place on the Sun is around 1 Gauss, about twice as strong as the average field on the surface of Earth (around 0.5 Gauss). Since the Sun’s surface is more than 12,000 times larger than Earth’s, the overall influence of the Sun’s magnetic field is vast. The magnetic field of the Sun actually extends far out into space, beyond the furthest planet. This distant extension of the Sun’s magnetic field is called the Interplanetary Magnetic Field (IMF). The solar wind, the stream of charged particles that flows outward from the Sun, carries the IMF to the planets and beyond. The solar wind and IMF interact with planetary magnetic fields in complex ways, generating phenomena such as the aurora.

Places where the Sun’s magnetic field is especially strong are called active regions, and often produce telltale sunspots. The local magnetic field in the neighborhood of a large sunspot can be as strong as 4,000 Gauss… much, much greater than the Sun’s average field. Disruptions in magnetic fields near active regions can spawn energetic explosions on the Sun such as solar flares and Coronal Mass Ejections (CME). The degree of complexity of the Sun’s field waxes and wanes over the course of each sunspot cycle.

The exact nature and source of the Sun’s magnetic field are areas of ongoing research. Turbulent motions of charged plasmas in the Sun’s convective zone clearly play a role. Some of the Sun’s magnetism may even be a remnant from the primordial cloud from which the Sun formed. Some of the spectacular structures seen in the solar atmosphere, such as solar prominences and coronal loops, are fantastic visible indicators of material flowing along magnetic field lines which arc thousands of kilometers above the Sun’s surface.

Hinode

Hinode project is exploring the magnetic fields of the Sun, and is improving our understanding of the mechanisms that power the solar atmosphere and drive solar eruptions.  Solar-B, now named Hinode (Sunrise), was successfully launched from Japan’s Uchinoura Space Center. (Click HERE for RealVideo or HERE for Windows Media)

The Hinode mission is a follow-on to the highly successful Japan/US/UK Yohkoh (Solar-A) satellite which operated between 1991 and 2001. Led by the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Space Science Research Division (formerly the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS)), Hinode consists of a coordinated set of optical, EUV, and X-ray instruments that will investigate the interaction between the Sun’s magnetic field and its corona. The result will be an improved understanding of the mechanisms that power the solar atmosphere and drive solar eruptions. This information will tell us much about how the Sun generates magnetic disturbances and high-energy particle storms that propagate from the Sun to the Earth and beyond; in this sense, Hinode will help us predict “space weather.”

Hinode (Solar-B) has been placed in a sun-synchronous orbit around Earth at an altitude of about 600 km. A sun-synchronous orbit is a special type of polar orbit in which a satellite passes over the same part of the Earth at roughly the same local time each day.

Activity of Sunspot Cycle 24

The stability of the Earth’s rotation is especially vulnerable since it already spins at an angle of over twenty-three degrees off centre, and has a lopsided distribution of weight across its surface. The concentration of weight lies mostly along the major land masses of the Americas, Europe and Africa. On the other side of the Earth is the Pacific Ocean, which is Earth’s greatest water mass and much less dense.  This uneven weight distribution compounds the stability issue of the Earth.  The uneven distribution of weight has been further exacerbated by global warming.  The poles have been melting and adding water to the oceans. Additionally galactic alignment will occur in 2012; the sun will be aligned to the ecliptic plane of the Milky Way.

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11 Comments

  1. And if the the sun flips the pole, so we are counting with 4 poles, that not means, the dynamo principe?
    And if the center of the earth it’s filled with liquid “melted” metal, that not means a partial acceleration of the magma flow from mother earth? we are not so far away…!

  2. Sorry about that; intended to comment on the para, ‘The exact nature…’, but got distracted by the need to counterblather (sigh).

    Okay, heres a simple science-experiment: get. piece of silk, and a plastic rod (a dollar-store toothbrush is ideal; grab the bristles, and go…)
    Then, set your kitchen faucet to run the smallest stream possible–just before it breaks up into drops.
    Rub your rod with the silk, and bring it close to the stream–it deflects (and looks way-cool, too!)
    And, a magnet does–what???

    Now, if we recall that a Van de Graff generator can be configured (with a cored coil) to be a crude electromagnet, perhaps this has something to do with it…

    Engineers: yes, this is horrendously inefficient; the sun, however, has energy to burn (heh)…and we should be grateful, else wed be up to the eyeballs in sunspots…

    Science rocks, Grant

    P. S. If anyone wants to know a nifty, at-home way to SEE magnetic field-lines (and understand CMEs), let me know, and Ill post it… G.

    1. ok..so I'm a year late in requesting to see the magnetic field lines of the sun, but if you are still responding to the original post, I would love to learn more about it….Peace. Laura

  3. This is also covered in greater detail as explained by NASA boffins at web page below (link).
    What is NOT being explained anywhere are the forces or energies that are prompting the sun magnetic field to ‘flip’ . Whilst it IS a cycle – is it a cycle at the Sun’s instigation or one which is generated by greater galactic (possibly) electro-magnetic fields or vortex fields set up by the travel of (say for example) the whole Solar System and its Heliosphere through the Galaxy /or even the Galaxy through space…..?
    What are the factors causing the energies that are accelerating /delaying the magnetic shift to vary in strength and time?
    These are the issues that will most effect our lives.

    (I’m not saying that anyone knows but it is the real search that would answer many of our questions!)

    Thank you for keeping us posted.

    http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2012/04/the-great-switch-suns-magnetic-field-does-a-complete-reverse-every-11-years.html

  4. Um…huh?

    Look: theres two fundamental challenges faced by the species (humans): one, the stuff we cant do anything about–earthquakes, volcanoes, solar flares, meteorites, all that; all we can do is be mindful of the constant possibility (&low probability) and learn survival skills; then, not sweat what we cant prevent.

    Then, theres the second threat: to nutshell it, thats Human Stupidity. Industries that befoul air and water for a buck, that refuse to recognize science because doing so means they might have to forego todays Quick Buck–and all the rest of us, for letting Big Daddy get away with it. Just recycling your poly-bags wont cut it (in fact, toss ’em; your grandkids will bless your bones, when theyre mining the landfill after it all goes thud) unless you also realize that lining up for that ‘new’ Ipad IS the problem! If you dont buy that shiny plastic crap, they wont kill the planet, to sell it to you!!!
    Could it BE any simpler? Are YOU the problem?
    Excuse me, gotta go; Im late for my flint-knapping class…

    G.

  5. Ice in the northern and southern hemisphere is melting and refreezing so the earth itself is not going to flood over or anything but, there will be changes in land and some land will eventually go underwater but not at once, people will have the time to evacuate.

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