"The video released by researchers shows vortices of hot plasma that ebb and flow like bubbles in a pot of boiling water. Hot plasma is transported up from below the sun’s surface to a cooler area; as it cools, it drops back down to the inner parts of the star."
From "New video of the sun supports theory of what happens on its surface/Images of the sun’s surface that were published in a new study show turbulent, vortex-like structures in unprecedented detail" (WaPo)(gift link with video).

30 comments:
It is my opinion that the sun is getting larger and will soon eat us.
What's can been seen on the Sun's surface is insignificant compared to the convection layer between the photosphere and the core where the thermonuclear furnace has been operating more or less steadily for 5 billion years. Those convection layers are so vastly complex that it takes 10,000 to 170,000 years for a megajoule of core output to reach the surface and be radiated out to space.
Wow. Note, each of those cornflake-looking splotches in the video is about the size of the state of Texas.
My favorite sun factlet: In the fusing core itself, the energy produced per cubic meter is roughly the same as an ordinary compost pile.
"Fahrenheit"? WTF?
When someone says their hatred of something is "incandescent as the sun", you can always know they mean business.
While the use of decimate for devastate is a pet peeve of mine, having a supposedly respected newspaper editor allow "surface of the sun" to appear in a headline is orders of magnitude more annoying. Reminds me of the Aggie who proposed to NASA that solar studies would be easier if astronauts went there at night, when it would be cooler.
“My favorite sun factlet: In the fusing core itself, the energy produced per cubic meter is roughly the same as an ordinary compost pile.”
Also: per cubic meter you produce several times as much energy as the core of the sun.
Bubbles of hot plasma that ebb and flow like boiling water? Or like most people's guts after a Tuesday at Taco Bell?
“It is my opinion that the sun is getting larger and will soon eat us.”
Yes. That’s why you shouldn’t buy green bananas.
Are you sure that video isn't of some upholstery at Mar-a-Lago?
The surface of the Sun is chaotic, not unstable.
Daniel K. Inouye, senator in the Ira Contra hearings.
That's why you want to land at night.
And to think, Katie Porter dumped a pot of that on her poor husband's head.
The respected newspaper didn't print 'surface of the sun,' it printed "'surface' of the sun."
Read carefully. I am reminded of how some people went ballistic over Studs Turkel's "The 'Good War'"
So?
Is the Sun trans-gendered?
That's the only thing the WaPOSt cares about these days...
8/5/26, 3:55 PM
In about 5 billion years, the Sun will exhaust the hydrogen in its core and leave the main sequence.
It will then spend several hundred million years expanding into a red giant.
Around 7–8 billion years from now, the Sun will reach its largest size.
But as the sun’s mass is reduced the distance from earth to sun will increase due to Kepler’s laws and it is not clear to modern science if the earth will actually be inside the sun, or just near the surface. Neither option is good.
To be clear, the earth will in the end be inside the sun because tidal forces will crack it up and it will fall into the sun regardless.
"Neither option is good."
Maybe it can be avoided if everybody starts eating bugs right away.
“ In a 2009 interview on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien, while discussing geothermal energy, Gore said:
“The interior of the earth is extremely hot, several million degrees…”’
But it is no surprise that Al Gore is scientifically illiterate. The interior of the earth is not 990,000 degrees hotter than the sun, in Centigrade or Fahrenheit.
"The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees
Yo ho, it's hot
The sun is not
A place where we could live
But here on Earth there'd be no life
Without the light it gives
We need its light
We need its heat
We need its energy
Without the sun
Without a doubt
There'd be no you and me"
- They Might Be Giants
I do love me some They Might Be Giants!
I got to see them live at The Stone Balloon in 1997 in Newark, Delaware. Great show.
Hey, Techsan, did you know that TMBG did an updated version of that song to reflect their updated understanding of the science? It was interesting.
Here’s the set list from that show:
https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/they-might-be-giants/1997/stone-balloon-newark-de-43d6e3c7.html
Did you know there was a website that collects set lists from shows. I can’t in general vouch for its accuracy overall. But how fun!
https://www.setlist.fm/
rcommal: missed the remix...appreciate the pull!
A friend and I caught them at The Rave in Milwaukee... there are 3 or 4 possibilities...I don't recall the specific date.
https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/they-might-be-giants/1997/the-rave-milwaukee-wi-4bd6e3a6.html
Great catalog. The song "No" was a fun one to listen to when the kids were JrH/HS aged.
Cool!
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