image: Multiwavelength extreme ultraviolet image of the Sun taken by the Solar Dynamics Observatory's Atmospheric Imaging Assembly. Colors represent different gas temperatures: ~800,000 Kelvin (blue), ~1.3 million K (green), and ~ 2 million K (red). New observations reveal jets of hot plasma propelled upwards from the region immediately above the Sun's surface and help explain why the Sun's outer atmosphere, or corona, is much hotter than its surface. This image relates to an article that appeared in the Jan. 7, 2011, issue of Science, published by AAAS. The study, by Dr. Bart De Pontieu at Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory in Palo Alto, Calif., and colleagues was titled, "The Origins of Hot Plasma in the Solar Corona." view more
Credit: Image courtesy of Bart De Pontieu