AS102 Study Guide - Final Guide: Solar Wind, Radiography, Photosphere
Document Summary
By watching sunspots (through a filter, of course) it becomes clear that the sun is rotating. In fact, it rotates faster at the equator (once every 27 days) than it does closer to either pole (once every 31 days). As you start your journey into the sun"s surface you will notice a sort of headwind, called the solar wind consisting of energetic protons, electrons, ions, and subatomic particles. The sun is constantly spewing out such particles in all directions at speeds up to 1000 km/second resulting in an additional loss of mass (the other loss being in the form of radiation energy; light that keeps us alive). Here is a three-minute video about the solar wind as well as other surface storms. http://www. youtube. com/watch?v=fjptnxdgqgc. As discussed in section 5. 5, the region above the. Sun"s surface is called the corona where the average temperature is a surprising 1 million k and is the source of many of the sun"s x-rays.
