See query.
Watching NASA prequel: Helium, massive solar coronas, Einstein’s GTR proved all discovered, observed first time in total solar eclipses.
What are science people salivating for?
And just in case ECG wants to slap me with a warning for an (accurate) link, there really isn’t anything new to be discovered. We have had plenty of spacecraft directly observe the sun from orbit–spacecraft that can create their own artificial eclipse any time that they wish. There is nothing to be learned from watching an eclipse that can’t be done earlier and better by those satellites.
People watch eclipses because eclipses are cool.
They’re hoping for a cool, infrequent celestial event.
So, all these scientist are doing stuff for shits an giggle?
I am a solar physicist, and can confirm this is accurate for me and many of my colleagues. Many went to a solar physics conference in Portland and will be enjoying the eclipse together. But a few are flying instruments on aircraft, or making scientific observations from mobile instruments.
Solar eclipses are actually very important for solar observing satellites, because observing a known sharp edge (edge of the moon) is a great way to calibrate the image processing software. But that doesn’t necessarily happen when there’s an eclipse on the ground.
There will be some actual research. But the eclipse path does not go through any major observatories, and there’s only so much we can do with portable equipment. Especially since spacecraft can see the lower solar atmosphere all the time, and there are special telescopes (coronagraphs) on mountains that can observe the outer corona any time.
As I said, most American solar physicists are either at the conference that was scheduled to be this week at the eclipse path, or taken the day off. I’m in a Walmart parking lot in the eclipse path with eclipse glasses in hand.
How much of the “Helium” discovery or massive coronas was a “surprise?” I’m thinking relative to the Mercury observation for Einstein (I presume that’s what NASA was referring to), which was anticipated and prepped for to the finest detail.
Or the significance of which (in any other solar eclipses) only became apparent some time later?
The helium discovery was not anticipated at all, but it wasn’t the only element thought to be found there. The corona has some unusual Fraunhofer lines which come from highly ionized iron, but which were initially thought to be from a new element (“coronium”). The same thing could have been the case with the helium lines. At the time, the noble gases were totally unknown and, based just on the spectral lines, helium was thought to be a metal (which is why it ends with -ium, an indicator of a metalic element).
BTW, once they figured out what those “coronium” lines were (not until the 1940s), they realized that the temperature of the corona must be over a million Kelvins. So that’s a belated discovery based on observations during eclipses.
The General Relativity confirmation has nothing to do with Mercury. Rather, it’s the observation that star light is bent by its near passage to the sun. And yes, someone intentionally went out and observed stars during an eclipse and found they were displaced from their usual place.
Thanks for the reply.
Yes, I was on autopilot about the Mercury perihelion observation, rather than the 1919 Eddington one during the solar eclipse.
Wiki Tests of General Relativity has notes on follow-up eclipse observations.