Unprecedented images of the Sun's turbulent surface, captured by the Inouye solar telescope in Hawaii, show golden bands and swirling vortices. These are the most detailed pictures ever taken of our star, revealing new features smaller than 20km (12 miles) across in a magnetically active region near a sunspot.
Astronomers observed these small whirlpool-like structures, identified as Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities (KHIs). These instabilities form when fast-moving plasma interacts with slower fluid, creating shear that leads to spiralling vortices.
Scientists suggest these processes on the surface are likely to explain the long-standing mystery of why the Sun's corona, its outer atmosphere, is millions of degrees hotter than its surface, while the surface itself is around 6,000C. Dr. David Kuridze, an astronomer on the team, stated this could solve a major mystery in solar physics.