University students and faculty soon will have the chance to peer at day-to-day weather through the same lens used by National Weather Service meteorologists. A new version of the NWS’s workhorse graphics software will reach campuses through UCAR’s Unidata program.
To get at driving forces deep within the Sun, new models aim to unify the Sun’s dynamo and the emergence of magnetic flux—two areas that are challenging to model individually, let alone together.
When a geomagnetic storm blasted Earth on January 24, commercial airlines redirected a handful of flights were originally routed to fly over the North Pole. Behind the scenes, NCAR scientists play a role in safety precautions such as these.
A balloon-borne instrument sailing in the Arctic stratosphere in June obtained some of the best observations to date on the high-speed, Sun-driven winds that howl through the thermosphere more than 100 kilometers (60 miles) above Earth.
The Sun drives our climate, so a slowdown in solar activity would surely put the brakes on global warming—wouldn’t it? That question percolated through the media following a set of reports from a solar physics meeting.
The solar minimum that bottomed out from 2006 to 2010 was the longest and deepest since modern space observations began. Among other effects, it reorganized the areas of flux from open magnetic field lines that produce solar wind. NCAR postdoctoral researcher Liang Zhao is using data from the last two minima to revise a model of how open magnetic flux is transported through the solar atmosphere.
An international team of astronomers that includes NCAR’s Savita Mathur has observed mixed waves—a mixture of acoustic and gravity waves—that run all the way to the cores of red giant stars. Astronomers already knew that such waves (known as stellar oscillations) existed, but until now had only observed pure acoustic waves traveling through the outer parts of stars.
One of the most enduring mysteries in solar physics is why the Sun’s outer atmosphere, or corona, is millions of degrees hotter than its surface. Now scientists believe they have discovered a major source of hot gas that replenishes the corona.
A new study from NCAR uses an innovative computer model to investigate events called sudden stratospheric warmings (SSWs) in the Arctic atmosphere. The study focuses on how two atmospheric patterns based in the tropics, the El Niño–Southern Oscillation and Quasi-Biennial Oscillation, affect SSWs.
In a bid to unlock longstanding mysteries of the Sun, including the impacts on Earth of its 11-year cycle, a team of scientists from NCAR, France, and Spain has successfully probed a distant star.
Scientists have detected "starspots," on the surface of a star using stellar seismology. The technique offers the potential to examine hundreds of stars.
Results from a new study should help scientists better understand the factors controlling the timing of solar cycles and could lead to better predictions.
Between 1969 and 1971, NCAR scientist John Eddy set out to archive an important part of the history of both photography and astronomy. Eddy collected more than 100 pictures of total solar eclipses taken from the late 1800s into the mid-1900s.
NCAR’s Coronal Multichannel Polarimeter (CoMP) found a new home early this year on Hawaii’s Mauna Loa, a high-elevation paradise for astronomical observers.
Solar scientists have long debated why the Sun's corona, or atmosphere, is millions of degrees hotter than its surface. Images retrieved by the Hinode satellite, launched in 2006, are shining some light on this paradox.
If the last few years have seen a so-called quiet Sun, its silence has spoken volumes. Researchers have taken advantage of a raft of new sensors and a special observing campaign to learn much about what happens when the sun temporarily powers down.
The solar minimum that bottomed out from 2006 to 2010 was the longest and deepest since modern space observations began. Among other effects, it reorganized the areas of flux from open magnetic field lines that produce solar wind.
The public is keenly interested in the Sun and its doings. “Sunspots” is one of the most frequent search terms bringing visitors to the NCAR/UCAR website.
In a breakthrough that will help scientists unlock mysteries of the Sun and its impacts on Earth, an international team of scientists from NCAR and the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research has created the first-ever comprehensive computer model of sunspots.
