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SOLAR Center Highlights

Welcome! Here's a quick overview of our featured pages. To begin, select an area of the site from the links below. Please let us know if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, so we can improve your visit here.

About the SunActivitiesSolar ArtSolar Folklore



Solar flareAuroraSun pillarblue eit solar image

About the Sun Featured Pages
News About the Sun
Includes information from NASA featuring information about solar flares, solar wind, and recent developments.
The Sun on Earth Have you ever wondered about how rainbows work, what causes the aurora, why the setting sun is red, and why we sometimes see a halo around the Sun? If you need a research topic, or are just curious about how things work, there are lots of questions to explore here.
Watch the Sun Move The Sun's oscillations are far too tiny to be seen with the naked eye, but sensitive instruments on the SOHO spacecraft can detect the movements and translate them into something we can see. This page features videos of sun-striking comets & coronal mass ejections.
Exploring the Sun This page features links that provide many different resources. Here you can take virtual tours of the sun, look at solar imagery, and learn about the sun and its layers.
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Galileo portraitSpectroscopeSunspotter telescopelayers of the sun

Activities Featured Pages
Scavenger Hunt Want to earn a magnificent solar poster, and have your name and school enscribed on the web? Complete our Scavenger Hunt, and we'll do just that!
Take the Galileo Challenge Galileo was one of the first and most important observers of the Sun. Why do you think these observations were important to Galileo and to the people of his time? Imagine you are Galileo and test your knowledge.
Build Your Own Spectroscope Build and learn how to use your own working spectroscope. Find out what spectroscopic data can tell astronomers about the Sun, planets, stars, and other objects far away.
Observe the Sun Yourself This page shows several ways in which you can observe the sun yourself. Make your own pinhole camera, use a sunspotter telescope, or use a remote telescope via the web!
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Heart of the Sun paintingSolar analemmaSimulation of solar convectionUrrealism page

Solar Art Featured Pages

Images by Artists Features art from solar data, paintings, and art submitted to the SOLAR center inspired by the sun.
Photographs of Analemmas A combination of the Earth's 23.5 degree tilt and its slightly elliptical orbit combine to generate a figure "8" pattern of where the Sun would appear at the same time throughout the year. The pattern is called an analemma.
Scientific Images Includes a visual simulation of solar convection, SOHO's halo orbit, power spectra, and many other examples of scientific images that can be viewed as art.
The Sun in Music Here you can listen to the sounds of the sun and space and learn about sonification, or how data can be turned into sounds.
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sunset and cloudsflower patternmachu-picchu ruinsrock art

Solar Folklore Featured Pages
For centuries, humans have attempted to explain the Sun in terms of their own worldviews. These myths, legends and accounts represent their culture's worldview, a peoples' attempt to explain, understand, and come to grips with nature's phenomena.
Here you can learn about ancient astronomical sites around the world, featuring the Bighorn Medicine Wheel- a Native American pointer to sun and stars. Medicine wheels are an intricate part of their spirituality and connection to the Earth and sky.
Ancient cultures certainly observed the celestial bodies. But because so few of them left any written records, it is difficult to imagine how they interpreted the skies. A few examples remain of imagery, usually left in rock which may refer to the Sun.
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