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Space
Space
Science
Sharmila Kuthunur

How Solar Orbiter is decoding the sun's mysterious miniflares: 'What we see is just the tip of the iceberg'

The sun looks magnificent in a video sequence captured by the Solar Orbiter's Extreme Ultraviolet Imager ahead of its close pass at the star on Oct. 12, 2022.

Three months ago, scientists spotted tiny, short-lived energy jets surfacing from dark regions in the corona, the sun's outer atmosphere. 

Upon closer look, these jets appeared as bright flashes everywhere on the sun's disk. They lasted only 20 to 100 seconds but packed a powerful punch: A single minute-long jet carried energy equivalent to the power consumed by 10,000 homes in the U.K. in a year. 

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