Here’s looking at you, Sun

I know it’s Hubble’s birthday, but there’s a new kid in town. NASA’s new Solar Dynamics Observatory is turning out images of the Sun. NASA says the SDO will have an impact on astronomy much like Hubble’s:

Some of the images from the spacecraft show never-before-seen detail of material streaming outward and away from sunspots. Others show extreme close-ups of activity on the sun’s surface. The spacecraft also has made the first high-resolution measurements of solar flares in a broad range of extreme ultraviolet wavelengths.

“These initial images show a dynamic sun that I had never seen in more than 40 years of solar research,” said Richard Fisher, director of the Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “SDO will change our understanding of the sun and its processes, which affect our lives and society.”