Plasma jets are prime suspect in solar mystery

Plasma jets are prime suspect in solar mystery

(PhysOrg.com) -- One of the most enduring mysteries in solar physics is why the Sun's outer atmosphere, or corona, is millions of degrees hotter than its surface. Now scientists believe they have discovered a major source of hot gas that replenishes the corona: narrow jets of plasma, known as spicules, shooting up from just above the Sun's surface. The finding addresses a fundamental question in astrophysics: how energy moves from the Sun's interior to create its hot outer atmosphere.