In a very short time, during December, NASA's Parker solar probe will become the man-made object that has come closest to the Sun. While waiting for this event, the American space agency is offering us a new, unprecedented insight into the life of our star thanks to a 3D simulation.
Using the Pléiades supercomputer, the team from NASA's Ames research center was able for the first time to reproduce the fine structures of the upper layers of the Sun using data from the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO).
Terabytes of data for a very small portion of the Sun
It took several weeks of intensive work on the supercomputer and terabytes of data to produce this 3D rendering which represents only a very small portion of the Sun. “ Currently, we do not have the computational capabilities to create realistic global models of the entire Sun due to its complexity », Explains Irina Kitiashvili, scientist at the Ames research center who participated in carrying out this simulation.
“ That's why we create models of smaller areas or layers, which can show us structures in the solar surface and atmosphere, like shock waves or tornado-like features measuring just a few kilometers; these are much finer details that no spacecraft can reproduce. »
The simulation shows the upper layers of the Sun
In the simulation, the ascending flows shown in bright red are the most dynamic while the yellow, green and blue areas represent the slower flows.
“ Our simulations use what we call a realistic approach, which means that we include everything we know to date about solar plasma to reproduce the different phenomena observed by NASA space missions. », adds Irina Kitiashvili.
Launched in 2010, the Solar Dynamics Observatory is one of the spacecraft used by to monitor the sun and its phenomena. Improving our knowledge of our star helps us to better understand its link with the Earth, which we know influences ocean currents, weather, climate and many other phenomena. Studying the behavior of the Sun is also essential for the safety of spacecraft and manned missions.
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