Several satellites, including NASA’s new Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), recorded on Sunday a small solar flare erupting above sunspot 1092, the size of the Earth. The satellites also recorded a large filament of cool gas stretching across the Sun’s northern hemisphere also exploded into space.

The explosion, called a coronal mass ejection, was aimed directly towards Earth, which then sent a “solar tsunami” racing 93 million miles across space, the New Scientist reported. When the violent cloud hits, which could be anytime now, it could spark aurorae in the skies around the poles and pose a threat to satellites, although not a severe one, it said.

Despite being separated by hundreds of thousands of kilometres, the two events may be linked, said astronomers who studied the images from SDO that hint at a shock wave travelling from the flare into the filament.

“These are two distinct phenomena but they are obviously related,” said Len Culhane, a solar physicist at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, University College London. Experts said the wave of supercharged gas will likely reach the Earth on Tuesday, when it will buffet the natural magnetic shield protecting Earth.

It is likely to spark spectacular displays of the aurora or northern and southern lights. “This eruption is directed right at us,” said Leon Golub, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics.

“It’s the first major Earth-directed eruption in quite some time,” Golub was quoted as saying by the Telegraph. NASA recently warned that Britain could face widespread power blackouts and be left without critical communication signals for long periods of time, after the earth is hit by a once-in-a-generation “space storm”.

Earlier scientists had said that they believed the Earth would be hit with unprecedented levels of magnetic energy from solar flares after the Sun wakes “from a deep slumber” sometime around 2013.

It remains unclear, however, how much damage this latest eruption will cause the world’s communication tools. Dr Lucie Green, of the Mullard Space Science Laboratory, Surrey, who followed the flare-ups using Japan’s orbiting Hinode telescope, said this was a very rare event.

“Not one, but two almost simultaneous eruptions from different locations on the Sun were launched toward the Earth.

“These eruptions occur when immense magnetic structures in the solar atmosphere lose their stability and can no longer be held down by the Sun’s huge gravitational pull. Just like a coiled spring suddenly being released, they erupt into space.”

“This means we have a very good chance of seeing major and prolonged effects, such as the northern lights at low latitudes.”

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A rocket ‘Atlas V’ carrying the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) was on Thursday launched from Florida’s Atlantic Coast.

The SDO is the first-of-its-kind spacecraft designed to study the sun, the agency said.

It is expected to unlock the processes inside the sun, on its surface, and in its corona that result in solar variability which when experienced on Earth, is called space weather.

The five-year mission will disclose the sun’s inner workings by constantly taking high resolution images, collecting readings from its inside and measuring its magnetic field activity.

It “will determine how the sun’s magnetic field is generated, structured and converted into violent solar events like turbulent solar wind, solar flares and coronal mass ejections,” according to the agency.

This data is expected to eventually help researchers predict solar storms and other activity on the sun that can affect spacecraft in orbit, astronauts on the International Space Station and electronic and other systems on Earth.

This will further allow us to accommodate or mitigate the effects of space weather — which can disable satellites, cause power grid failures and disrupt GPS, TV and telecommunication signals, the agency said.

The mission — a part of the agency’s science program ‘Living With a Star’ developed to understand and address those aspects of the sun and solar system that directly affect life and society — will also measure the extreme ultraviolet irradiance of the sun that is a key driver to the structure and composition of Earth’s upper atmosphere.

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ISRO (Indian Space Research Organization) lost control of Chandrayaan-1 last month, and aborted the mission ahead of schedule, but not before M3 and the other instruments had beamed data back to Earth.

According to a report in The Times, water was found by NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3), designed specifically to search for water by picking up the electromagnetic radiation emitted by minerals.

M3 was one of two NASA instruments among 11 pieces of equipment from around the world on Chandrayaan-1, which was launched into orbit around the Moon in October last year.

The M3, an imaging spectrometer, was designed to search for water by detecting the electromagnetic radiation given off by different minerals on and just below the surface of the Moon.

Unlike previous lunar spectrometers, it was sensitive enough to detect the presence of small amounts of water.

The M3 also made the unexpected discovery that water may still be forming on the surface of the Moon, according to scientists familiar with the mission.

“It’s very satisfying,” said Dr Mylswamy Annadurai, the project director of Chandrayaan-1 at the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in Bangalore.

“This was one of the main objectives of Chandrayaan-1, to find evidence of water on the Moon,” he told The Times.

This will also provide a significant boost for India as it tries to catch up with China in what many see as a 21st-century space race.

“This will create a considerable stir. It was wholly unexpected,” said one scientist also involved in Chandrayaan-1.

“People thought that Chandrayaan was just lagging behind the rest but the science that’s coming out, it’s going to be agenda-setting,” the scientist added.

Scientists have long hoped that astronauts could be based on the Moon and use water found there to drink, extract oxygen to breathe and use hydrogen as fuel.

Several studies have suggested that there could be ice in the craters around the Moon’s poles, but scientists have been unable to confirm the suspicions.

According to another lunar scientist familiar with the findings, “This is the most exciting breakthrough in at least a decade. And it will probably change the face of lunar exploration for the next decade.”

Source:  http://www.zopag.com/news/indias-greatest-discovery-chandrayaan-finds-water-on-moon/7746.html