There is a huge hole in the Sun!

There is a huge hole in the Sun!

How big you might query .

Try 50 Earths that's how big.

As scary as a hole 50 Earths might be it is even scarier  because  the  huge  hole  spews  out  a
stream  of  high - speed solar wind, creating a geomagnetic  storm  close  to our own planet.

The image was taken on October 10 in wavelengths of 193 Angstroms, which is invisible to our
eyes. The dark spot, known as a coronal hole, which materialized last week remains harmless to
humans  on Earth but can interfere  with satellite  communications and some high-altitude radio
signals.

Coronal holes appear randomly on the outer layer of the sun, making it look darker than the
rest  of  the  star.   Caused  b y anomalies  in  the sun's  magnetic  field,  th e darker patch is
abundant with colder, less dense, low-energy gas and plasma.

Find complete article HERE

Theoretical Force Field Could Make Space Travel Safer.

One of the more daunting challenges to long term space travel and colonization are "cosmic rays" which are extremely dangerous and difficult to block. Now scientists at the Science and Technology Facilities Council's Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, the Universities of York, Strathclyde, and IST Lisbon have shown that it is possible to create portable, artificial magnetospheres. These would direct the solar wind away from spacecraft or other threatened area.

Science Daily notes that earlier computer simulations have been confirmed "in the laboratory in the UK using apparatus originally built to work on fusion. By recreating in miniature a tiny piece of the Solar Wind, scientists working in the laboratory were able to confirm that a small "hole" in the Solar Wind is all that would be needed to keep the astronauts safe on their journey to our nearest neighbors."

Now the next challenge is to make, and affordably power, a full scale model and make certain that it isn't itself a danger to astronauts.

<Science Daily via SF Signal>