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.
A small flare in cool magnesium light
Credit: IRIS, LMSAL/NASA, Sean Brannon
This IRIS scan of Active Region (AR) 12772 includes an appearance by a small flare. Although quite brief, in the relatively cool (~10,000 K) magnesium light this flare display some intriguing complexity. We see a quick flash along a Z-shaped pattern, followed by a second flash towards the bottom of the Z. From the second flash especially, there are loops visible that push outward, displacing darker features above which indicate absorbing plasma.