Scientists locate origin of the sun’s magnetic field

 I was lucky enough to catch an awesome glimpse of the northern lights from my own home this month when the biggest solar storm to reach Earth in two decades made auroras visible at latitudes much farther south than usual.

Despite living in the light-filled streets of central London, my smartphone camera picked up a green haze and a pulsing sheet of purple and pink light. Capturing the moment was an unforgettable experience and one that I had thought would involve expensive travel to the northernmost reaches of our planet.

The storms that create spectacular auroras such as those I witnessed originate from the sun’s dynamic magnetic field, an astrophysical enigma that scientists this week came closer to unraveling.

Solar update

Figuring out how the sun’s magnetic field works will help scientists improve the forecasting of space weather, which dazzles night sky watchers but can disrupt GPS and communication satellites.

The sun’s looping magnetic field lines, which form a tangled web of structures more complex than those on Earth, are difficult to study directly. To grasp what’s going on, scientists create mathematical models.

A new model, which took more than a decade to develop and required a NASA supercomputer to conduct the detailed calculations, found that the sun’s magnetic field is generated much closer to the surface than previously thought.

The team believes its model is more accurate because it accounts for a unique solar feature.