Judy Karpen – Naval Research Lab
“The Sun through new glasses: what’s hot in solar physics”
We study the Sun for many reasons, from purely intellectual and aesthetic to pragmatic. As our nearest star, it is the best-observed example of stellar structure and evolution on a wide range of timescales. As a cosmic body governed by the interaction between magnetic fields and ionized gas (plasma), the Sun provides an incomparable laboratory for studying the fundamental physical processes at the heart of human-made and astrophysical plasmas. Because the Earth and other planets are immersed in the envelope of the Sun, the Heliosphere, its changing effects on our daily lives can be disruptive as well as beneficial. I will survey briefly why understanding the Sun is important to physicists and astronomers, and demonstrate the wide range of observations with increasing spatial, temporal, and spectral resolution that have become available over the past decade. In addition, I will illustrate how these observational advances, coupled with the power of theory and numerical modelling, have led to recent breakthroughs in understanding the Sun.