Yesterday, an active region on the sun - basically, a collection of magnetically active sunspots - popped off a series of flares that were actually fairly energetic. NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory caught the action in this video:
[embed width="610"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3idSmR0ZYk[/embed]
Neat! These shots were in the ultraviolet, where flares are easier to spot. Sunspots are where the Sun's complex magnetic field pokes through the surface. The field lines store ridiculous amounts of energy (did you see my BAFact for today
?), and allow plasma - superheated, ionized gas - to flow along them. Think of these field lines like a pillowcase full of tightly wound springs. If one of them snaps - which can happen if they get too close to each other, for example, or when the churning surface of the Sun ratchets up the tension in the field lines beyond their capacity to restrain themselves - it blasts out ...
