Thanks to an unprecedented collaboration led by Barczynski between two of the most advanced solar observatories ever built - on Earth and in space - scientists are now able to dig deeper into our star's complexity.

On one end of the collaboration sits the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope, the largest solar telescope in the world, built and managed by the NSF National Solar Observatory (NSO) near the summit of Maui's Haleakala. On the other end, traveling as close as one-third of the Earth-Sun distance, is the space-borne Solar Orbiter (SolO), developed by the European Space Agency (ESA) with support from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

By combining these two vantage points, astronomers are effectively doing what a photographer might do: zooming in (with the Inouye) and moving closer (with SolO). The result? A more complete view of the Sun - both ground-based and space-based, from the surface layers up into the corona.

The Inouye is tuned to the Sun's middle layers (the photosphere and chromosphere), as well as the corona, around the solar limb; while Solar Orbiter captures the hotter, more ethereal realms of the transition region (between the chromosphere and the corona) and the corona. Together, the instruments provide an unprecedented sort of 3D, stereo view of solar structures - allowing scientists to trace structures from their roots up through to how they evolve.

Why This Matters: Three Game-Changers

First coordinated campaign - For the first time ever, the Inouye and SolO have operated in concert, aiming their instruments at the same solar active region, at the same time, to capture complementary data from ground and space.

True stereoscopic, high-resolution observations - This is not just two telescopes looking at the Sun; it is two of the most powerful solar instruments ever built sharing a view. The result is exceptionally sharp in both space (high spatial resolution) and time (high temporal resolution).

New insights into active regions - The campaign targeted a solar active region and delivered unprecedented detail, offering clues into how solar plasma moves, how the outer atmosphere is heated, and how eruptions which may impact Earth (e.g., solar flares) may be triggered.

According to Barczynski, tiny structures may hold the key to understanding solar phenomena. "Earlier studies suggested that the Sun's atmosphere may contain extremely small structures that had never been observed before." These have now been observed - and are known as "campfires." "Although each structure is small, their huge numbers mean they could have a powerful collective influence on the Sun's atmosphere, and even affect much larger solar formations."

These so-called "campfires" are tiny, extreme ultra-violet brightenings scattered across the Sun - fleeting, small-scale features that have largely gone unnoticed until recent cutting-edge instrumentation. While each event may seem insignificant on its own, because they occur in enormous numbers, their collective impact could shape how the Sun's outer layers are heated, and how plasma erupts or falls back into the Sun.

By coordinating Inouye's high-detail ground observations with SolO's space vantage, scientists can now trace how small features evolve, how they interact with large magnetic structures, and how energy flows through the solar atmosphere.

Beyond advancing our understanding of the Sun, the operation itself is an absolute triumph of engineering and logistics; aligning a ground-based telescope and a distant spacecraft to observe the same region of the Sun at the same moment is no mean feat. From an operational perspective, these observations demonstrate an extraordinary achievement: the Solar Orbiter in space and the Inouye Solar Telescope on Earth were precisely aligned to observe the same region of the Sun at the same time.

The dataset - from a campaign run in October 2022 - is now being analyzed by an international team of 18 researchers at the International Space Science Institute (ISSI) in Bern, Switzerland, and marks the beginning of a new era for solar physics. Furthermore, the dataset is public and was made available to the entire community without being embargoed at the Inouye and Solar Orbiter sites.

We have witnessed the Sun's giant loops; now we are hunting its micro-fires. And the results could reshape our understanding of how stars operate. In the coming months and years, as the data from this campaign, and others like it, are fully analysed, expect to see both surprising imagery and surprising science. The Sun has long been studied, but with tools like the Inouyes Solar Telescope and Solar Orbiter working together, we are seeing new layers of complexity. As Barczynski puts it: "Through coordinated observations we can now explore small-scale features in unprecedented detail - uncovering their properties and potentially discovering entirely new solar phenomena."

The star we rely on may look constant, but what lies beneath its shimmering surface is a wild frontier - and we are only just scratching it.

Research Report:First coordinated observations between Solar Orbiter and the Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope

Related Links
NSF National Solar Observatory
Solar Science News at SpaceDaily