IRIS Captures First-Ever Clear Images of Nanojets in Solar Corona

The solar corona, the outermost part of the Sun’s atmosphere, is shaped and mysteriously heated to millions of degrees by the magnetic field of our star.

It has long been hypothesized that the heating results from a myriad of tiny magnetic energy outbursts called nanoflares, driven by the fundamental process of magnetic reconnection.

Solar astronomers using NASA’s Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) mission have now discovered very fast and bursty nanojets, the telltale signature of reconnection-based nanoflares resulting in coronal heating.

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Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / Scientific Visualization Studio.

Antolin et al spotted nanojets in the solar corona.

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Each nanojet is believed to be initiated by a process known as magnetic reconnection where twisted magnetic fields explosively realign.

One reconnection can set off another reconnection, creating an avalanche of nanojets in the solar corona, a process that could create the energy that is heating the corona.