<\/p>\n Now, thanks to observations from a new high-resolution telescope, scientists have finally spotted elusive “magnetic waves” in the sun’s atmosphere that may be responsible for much of the corona’s incredible heating. The findings were published Oct. 24 in the journal Nature Astronomy<\/a>.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n New data from the National Science Foundation’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope (DKIST) in Hawaii \u2014 the largest ground-based solar telescope ever built<\/a> \u2014 is helping scientists learn how the sun’s energy is transported through its atmosphere.<\/p>\n A solar mystery<\/p>\n Researchers previously noted the extreme temperature of the sun’s corona, as well as the supercharged flow of heated gas, called the solar wind, which streams from the sun at more than 1 million mph (1.6 million km\/h), said Richard Morton<\/a>, a solar physicist and professor at Northumbria University in the U.K. who led the research, told Live Science in an email.<\/p>\n Both processes need energy, and scientists assumed rolling convection at the sun’s surface generated the requisite fuel. But complications arose during the first studies of this decades ago.<\/p>\n “It is unclear how this [energy] gets transferred into the atmosphere and solar wind, and how the energy is converted to heat and momentum,” Morton said.<\/p>\n In 1942, Swedish plasma physicist (and eventual Nobel Prize winner<\/a>) Hannes Alfv\u00e9n suggested magnetic waves may be responsible. But these waves, now known as Alfv\u00e9n waves, had never been spotted in the corona until now.<\/p>\n \n An illustration of twisting magnetic waves (inset) revealed by the Inouye Solar Telescope. These upward-traveling waves may be an essential ingredient in solving the mystery of why the sun\u2019s corona is so hot. (Image credit: NSF\/NSO\/AURA\/J. Williams)<\/p>\n “This was because the sensitivity of previous instrumentation has not been good enough to resolve the motions of the Alfv\u00e9n waves,” Morton said. “Despite this, many numerical experiments and space weather forecasting tools assume that Alfv\u00e9n waves exist in the corona. However, the properties of the waves they use within the models have been educated guesses.”<\/p>\n ‘Unprecedented’ observations<\/p>\n DKIST has a 4-meter (13 feet) mirror and an “unprecedented” resolution of the sun, Morton said, with much “cleaner measurements” (less noise) than any prior solar observatory. In the new research, scientists used the telescope’s Cryogenic Near Infrared Spectropolarimeter (Cryo-NIRSP) to search for the coronal Alfv\u00e9n waves.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n Cryo-NIRSP can chart movements of the corona through images, Morton said, as well as examine changes in the sun’s plasma (superheated gas) through a phenomenon known as Doppler shift \u2014 the perceived difference in the frequency of a wave as the observer and the source of the wave move toward or away from each other. (A common, real-life example is the change in the sound of an ambulance siren as it passes by a pedestrian on the street.)<\/p>\n “Cryo-NIRSP provided the data to enable us to observe the tell-tale signature of the Alfv\u00e9n waves, which in a plasma like the corona, is a back-and-forth twisting of the magnetic field<\/a>,” Morton said. “This appears as an alternating pattern of red and blue Doppler shifts on opposite sides of the magnetic fields. We found these waves were continually present during the time of observation, and given there was nothing particularly special about the region we observed, this implies they are always likely common across the rest of the atmosphere.\u201d<\/p>\n “Perhaps most importantly,” he continued, “our analysis indicates that waves likely carry a significant amount of energy.”<\/p>\n That is a significant finding, he noted, because astronomers have been debating between solar waves and magnetic reconnection<\/a> \u2014 when magnetic fields on the sun twist together and snap, releasing energy \u2014 as the mechanism behind the intense heating in the corona.<\/p>\n While various spacecraft have found evidence that magnetic reconnection is a driver of coronal heating, the new findings from DKIST show that the full picture is more complicated. Solar observatories such as NASA<\/a>‘s Parker Solar Probe<\/a> and the European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter, alongside the fresh data from DKIST, show “both waves and reconnection are occurring frequently throughout the Sun’s atmosphere,” Morton said.<\/p>\n “Our research confirms that the Alfv\u00e9n waves are present and carry a significant amount of energy, potentially making up at least half the required energy for heating the corona,” he added. “However, the exact energy associated with the waves is still challenging to estimate.”<\/p>\n![\"An](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/nPftzQhWd6zBiivsjYUnU4.jpg\")
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