HINODE OLD NEWS and IMAGES
October 31, 2006 - March 21, 2007
Note: These images may not be calibrated.
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Images from the NASA Press Conference
21 March 2007
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Hinode has obtained high resolution images of the poles of the Sun. One of these, seen above, shows a resolved spicule, which is approximately 300 miles across. For scale, the larger circle represents the diameter of the Earth; this is compared to several spicules jutting above the limb of the Sun.
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Magnetic field is a vector quantity, which can be resolved into vertical (line-of-sight) and horizontal components. The image above (middle) is taken from an SOT video that shows the line-of-sight component of the magnetic field of an evolving active region in which one sunspot collides with another (13 Dec 2006). Note the "whirls" between the spots (refer to image on the left to see the spots), suggestive that the magnetic field is sheared, storing energy in the field. Enough energy was indeed stored in the field as evidenced by the flare that occurred at approximately 2:30 UT on December 13 and as seen in the GOES plots below (and can also be seen in the movie). The other two images show the flare (right image) occurring in the chromosphere and on the left, we see the sunspots as observed in the photospheric layer of the solar atmosphere. For more images of the vector magnetic field of this region, NOAA AR 10930, go HERE.
The images below are plots of X-ray and Proton flux taken with instruments on board the GOES spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit around Earth. The dates of these plots correspond to the time that Hinode's instruments recorded flare events. The increase in flux on the plots is correlated with events occurring on the Sun.
For an explanation of the X-ray flare classifications, see Science@NASA's Flare classes.
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Hinode Sees Lunar Eclipse
17 February 2007
Images Courtesy of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ)
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Researchers used Hinode data from the 2007 February 17 partial eclipse of the Moon to
accurately calibrate the amount of stray light of the telescopes. To see more of how
this was done, see Partial Lunar Eclipse.
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These SOT images were obtained from the
27 Nov 2006 press conference.
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XRT Images
Click here for the full archive of XRT Images at SAO
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Active region 0938 (left image), now just past disk center on 19 Jan, 2007, is not expected to produce any major events within the next 24 hours. The XRT image in the middle was obtained at 18:48 UT on December 10, 2006 with the Be_med filter. The active region in the center of the field-of-view of that image is
NOAA Active Region 10930, which produced several X-class flares and many C-class flares. The XRT image on the right, was obtained on 23 Nov, 2006.
These images and the ones below, are courtesy of
Hinode's XRT group
at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center
for Astrophysics. To obtain full-resolution 2048x2048 images (if they exist),
click here.
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Transit of Mercury -- 8 November 2006
Images Courtesy of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ)
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These images are from the 8 November transit of Mercury. The SOT telescope took the
images in the light of CH G-band, at 4305 Å. For a 777 kB mpg-1 movie of the
transit, click here.
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The image on the left is a time sequence of Mercury before first contact, using XRT. The
image on the right also shows Mercury before first contact (the curved white line indicates
the solar limb), but using the EUV Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) instrument. Using these
images, the shadow of Mercury in coronal images before first contact was found.
These data will be
used to determine the offset in pointing between the three telescopes. For more information, view the pages at the Japanese site, HERE.
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The EUV Imaging Spectrometer has returned impressive images. For more information on EIS and for more images, see the pages HERE.
For the full press release of 2006 October 31, see JAXA Press Release.
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Images courtesy of JAXA, NAOJ, PPARC and NASA.
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