Solar Orbiter's First Images | NASA

Solar Orbiter's First Images | NASA

Solar Orbiter's First Images

This panel of high-resolution images from the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) on ESA/NASA’s Solar Orbiter spacecraft was taken with the HRIEUV telescope on May 30, 2020. The arrows point to the ‘campfires’ revealed for the first time by these images.

On May 30, Solar Orbiter was roughly halfway between the Earth and the Sun, closer to the Sun than any other solar telescope has ever been before. This allowed EUI to see features in the solar corona of only about 250 miles across. These images reveal a multitude of small flaring loops, erupting bright spots and dark, moving fibrils. These ubiquitous features of the solar surface, revealed for the first time by these images, have been called ‘campfires’. They are omnipresent miniature eruptions that could be contributing to the high temperatures of the solar corona and the origin of the solar wind.

View all of Solar Orbiter's first images on NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio.

Credits: Solar Orbiter/EUI Team (ESA & NASA); CSL, IAS, MPS, PMOD/WRC, ROB, UCL/MSSL

Last Updated: July 21, 2020

Editor: Miles Hatfield