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.
Last Hurrah for Major AR
Credit: IRIS, LMSAL/NASA, Lucas Guliano
AR13664 arrived in early May, 2024 and produced enough activity in the May solar storm to become the most famous AR of solar cycle 25. When it came back at the end of May as AR13697 (regions get new numbers if they rotate back around again) it continued its active ways with continued high level flare activity throughout its second trip across the disk. It is rare that a region will be around long enough to come back around a 3rd time, but this region was able to do just that by making a 3rd appearance in late June as AR13723. This time though, it appears that the region is finally running out of energy. Although it still has a few days left on the disk, this region has failed to produce any major flares. However, it was still able to muster up a few low level C-class flares in its old age. Just goes to show that even for a major region like this, it won't last forever.