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Total solar eclipse 2024: how it will help scientists to study the Sun

The Sun’s mysterious outer atmosphere, the corona, will become easier to view from Earth on 8 April.
  1. Sumeet Kulkarni
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Viewers along the eclipse’s path in North America will watch the Moon cross the Sun’s face and block the solar disk, offering the chance to see its outer atmosphere by eye. Credit: Alan Dyer/VW Pics/UIG via Getty

Researchers in North America are gearing up for their chance to observe the Sun’s corona — its wispy outer atmosphere — like never before. Normally hidden to the naked eye by the Sun’s glare, the corona will be visible to millions from Sinaloa, Mexico, to Newfoundland, Canada, when the Moon blocks the solar disk during the total eclipse on 8 April. Importantly, the event coincides with the solar maximum — a period of extreme activity that occurs every 11 years. During this time, the Sun’s magnetic fields intensify, creating sunspots, fiery loops of plasma and exciting structures in the corona.

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doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00973-1

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