Official News page 4

REAL LIFE NEWS: SUN MUSIC

by Hazed

Here Comes The Sun. Good Morning Sunshine. Sun A-rise. There are loads of songs that have been inspired by our sun, but now scientists have discovered that it actually produces music of its own.

Astronomers from the University of Sheffield have, for the first time, recorded musical harmonies produced by the sun's magnetic field. They found that the coronal loops - huge magnetic loops that coil away from the outer layer of the sun's atmosphere - sometimes vibrate, just like the strings on a musical instrument. In other cases they behave more like sound waves traveling through a wind instrument.

The scientists used satellite images of these loops, which can be over 60,000 miles long, to turn the visible vibrations into noises. They then sped up the frequency so it became audible to the human ear.

You can listen to the strangely beautiful music of the sun here.

Fed2 Star index Previous issues Fed 2 home page