IRIS Movie of the Day
At least once a week a movie of the Sun taken by NASA's Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) is posted by one of the scientists operating the instrument.
Filament plasma escaping the Sun
Credit: IRIS, LMSAL/NASA, Arkadiusz Berlicki
In the Mg II slit-jaw movie obtained on June 17, 2019 the filament eruption can be observed from around 00:20 UT. This phenomena is also well visible in SDO/AIA UV movies. Dense and relatively cool plasma was accelerated to high velocity by the magnetic force of the large-scale magnetic structure which supported the filament. Sometimes such magnetic system becomes unstable and then the plasma fall back onto the Sun, or erupt into space. Such eruption can be associated with a coronal mass ejection (CME), observed as a big bubble expanding in the heliosphere. If such CME is well positioned it can come towards Earth cause a geomagnetic storm. Space weather service keep an eye on filaments or prominences as they can be also a possible source of disturbances of Earth magnetosphere.