SUNSPOTS

Image 1: Sunspots as seen from SOHO in 2001. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/SOHO-EIT Consortium More Information: Solar and Heliospheric Observatory Image 2: Michelson Doppler Imager (MDI) onboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecrafttook this image of a stormy area on the Sun in which sunspots appear. Solar astronomers have long known that the intense magnetic field below a sunspot strangles the normal up-flow of energy from the hot solar interior, leaving the spot cooler and therefore darker than its surroundings. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/Solar & Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) More Information: Goddard Space Flight Center