All bow to the great photon generator Helos

[Alaskan]

COOL video, thought I'd share.

 

[Pi R Squared]

That's really great video of the sun. One of these days in the near future we will be able to build fusion reactors.

Alan

 

[NightExplorer96]

Neat video, thanks Alaskan. However, why is the sun rotating? Isn't the sun still?

-Alex

 

[Alaskan]

Only when it's spinning

Yes, the Sun does rotate. We can observe this by observing sunspots. All sunspots move across the face of the Sun. This motion is part of the general rotation of the Sun on its axis. Observations also indicate that the Sun does not rotate as a solid body, but it spins differentially. That means that it rotates faster at the equator of the Sun and slower at its poles. (The gas giants Jupiter and Saturn also have differential rotation.) The movements of the sunspots indicate that the Sun rotates once every 27 days at the equator, but only once in 31 days at the poles.

Padi Boyd

 

[Ricker]

Neat video, thanks Alaskan. However, why is the sun rotating? Isn't the sun still?

-Alex

I assume that's from us (Earth or satellite) revolving around the Sun. Just sped up. But wouldn't one rotation be a year? Maybe the surface of the Sun rotates like Jupiter's clouds and storms?

 

[Alaskan]

Posted the answer one minute before your post Ricker.

Here's another cool (or rather, hot) video:

 

[Laser Chick]

I can see why you would say that but it needs to revolve around a heavenly body, not itself to be considered a year as that is just rotation.

 

[Pi R Squared]

All stars rotate. There are a few different types of stars and they rotate at different speeds, and their size and age also effects their speed of rotation. Neutron stars rotate the fastest, black holes can rotate at more than 98% of the speed of light.

However, during a star's formation, there is a theoretical possibility of gravitational collapse without rotation. If this happened then a protostellar disk would not be formed, so this star would not have planets, asteroids, comets, etc. No such star has for sure ever been observed as far as I know.

Alan

 

[ped]

Interesting stuff.

 

[RedCowboy]

It's interesting that the CME's are mostly around the suns equator, almost as if there's an inertial effect.

 

[Laser Chick]

The suns magnetic fields play the largest part because CMEs and solar flares typically erupt from what are known as the active regions on the suns where magnetic fields are much stronger on average.

 

[Alaskan]